Infantus
by Corkindrill
Summary: In a little-known part of the Northlands, a descendant of King Mortspear has laid claim on a piece of his heritage. His actions echo all the way to Mossflower, where a misbehaving mousemaid decides that she's had quite enough of Redwall and sets out on her own not-really-sanctioned quest.
1. Chapter 1: No Thank Yous

**Chapter 1**

**No Thank Yous**

Just an afternoon's walk from the Abbey of Redwall, there was a meadow where the maids liked to go to gather wildflowers. One sunny and pleasant spring day, it saw rather a large group of Redwall's young females. But they were not there to make flower crowns or daisy-chains for themselves. They were hard at work. The countdown had begun toward the event of the season. Byron Merif, champion of the abbey, was getting married. There was to be a massive ceremony and feast for which the better part of Mossflower would come out of the woodwork. The Guosim would emerge from the Moss, and Skipper Dillon's crew, too. A number of Long Patrol hares would abandon whatever weasel or rat they were after at the moment and fly to Redwall as fast as their feet could carry them. For Byron, they would. The abbey would be bursting.

Sister Gertrude, who was running the show, wanted bright yellow things to decorate the altar tomorrow, and the ambitious Friar Milton required dandelions for the salad and wild rose petals to top the cake. The maidens, embiggened by the task, spread out gleefully over the meadow to seek these very important flowers. Maids of Redwall, in times of peace, often had little in their lives that made them feel valued, or excited.

But one of them, a young mousemaid called Nadine, felt neither valued nor excited. She was not much of a maid, but others called her that if they wished to be polite. She hung back under the tree line, in the shadows, and watched her friends disperse. It was a good opportunity to get away from them. She thought ahead and decided she would need a stream. To wipe her face later.

She found one nearby, a small stream that she could have jumped across, but full with the spring rains and the comforting gurgle of water. She collapsed beside it, and began to cry.

_I am a stupid, stupid creature_, she thought, weeping. It was a relief to be able to cry, finally, to fully wallow in her misery. This was why she volunteered to go pick flowers in the first place - to get out of the abbey so that she could for once sob freely.

Every time she thought of him, she was disgusted. Disgusted by his face, which to her was no longer handsome. She could not believe she had ever considered him handsome. His eyes were uneven, now that she thought of it—and beady. His kisses were clumsy and wet. The crooked way he smiled was no longer charming, but smug and vile. She was disgusted, not only by him but disgusted at herself for being taken in.

And now he was marrying someone else.

She lost herself to her aching throat and the powerful sobs that seemed to tear through her body. It wasn't until the rat stood in front of her that she even noticed him. She felt something move at the edge of her senses and looked up suddenly. And there he was, a toothy, gaunt beast, dressed in a tunic full of holes. He was a dark blot in what was otherwise peaceful and well-tamed greenery.

If Nadine wasn't in such a bad mood, she might have been scared.

"What do you want? Can't you see I'm busy?" She drew toward her basket, which she had tossed on the ground earlier. There was a little knife in it for cutting stems.

The rat produced a handkerchief. It was ragged, but of a bold tartan pattern, cut from some prouder creature's clothing. Nadine stared at it in disbelief. She was acutely aware of the snot running down her face now.

"Thank you," she said, taking it reluctantly. She blew her nose.

"Yew ought not t' say it," replied the rat. He had an accent that Nadine couldn't place. Northern, maybe. The 'say' was like 'sae' and the 'it' was like 'et'.

"What?"

"Don't thank nabeast. He might take ya oop on the obligation. Don't thank him, lest yer prepared to do his biddin'."

Nadine looked at him appalled.

The vagrant held out a paw. "Alms fer a weary traveler?"

"I—I don't have anything."

He pointed at her neck. Nadine clutched her necklace protectively. It was one of the few things she possessed herself, that single pearl drop. Then the rat drew a knife, and she became angry. He had cornered her because she was vulnerable and alone, played nice, and then turned nasty when she wouldn't give him what he wanted. Nadine was getting rather tired of malebeasts.

She dove for her own knife, screaming at the top of her lungs, "Thief! Help! HELP!"

There were surprised cries in the distance, followed by the cacophony of the entire party rushing to her aid. The rat stepped back uncertainly. Shortly, the other several maids arrived in a flurry of skirts and aprons and novice robes, and Nadine relaxed and stood straighter. She met eyes with the creature, before he bolted. He was really a smaller beast than what he seemed.

"Are you alright, Nadine?" Holly, a young vole, put a reassuring paw on her shoulder.

"Fine," Nadine replied, letting out the breath she was holding. "Thanks." She looked back at the group assembled behind her, their looks of concern and pity. "He was, uh, trying to rob me."

"You shouldn't have wandered away like that," said Fiora, an ottermaid. "What if he had done something worse? How could we face the abbess, after that? They'd never let us outside again!"

Nadine looked toward the stream. "I just wanted some water. Can we...why don't we just keep this quiet for now?"

Fiora gave her a suspicious look. "And why's that, Nadine? Something more go on here that we don't know about?"

There was a snicker from the crowd. Nadine was not sure who it came from exactly. She felt the stinging in her eyes that warned of tears coming, and swallowed to hold them back. She looked helplessly at Fiora. If the otter noticed Nadine tearing up, she pretended not to. Being stabbed would not have hurt as much as this, thought Nadine. Had they always hated her so? Nadine tried to think back to a time when these were all her unwavering friends, when she and Fiora would float leaf boats in the abbey pond, and capture fireflies after dusk.

Her voice raw, she replied "It would just worry beasts. Like you said, they might make us stay inside from now on."

Fiora grunted in assent and turned away, grumbling something that sounded like the word stupid, and the others followed her back. Nadine played fretfully with her necklace and shuffled after them. She discreetly wiped away the tears that trickled out now. Maybe the rat had a point. She regretted saying thanks. All it did was make others feel superior. Nowadays, everything she said and every move she made seemed to be fraught in ways she didn't understand. Did beasts talk about her? What rumors abounded behind her back?

_Did Byron talk?_ she wondered, with a fresh desire to throttle something. _Well, they can all go jump in the river._

Nadine resolved to tolerate their disapproval no longer. Now was a fine time to leave Redwall. The abbess would never let an inexperienced mousemaid venture out alone without protection, and in any case Nadine did not want to have to explain her reasons for leaving to any authority. She schemed to slip out quietly, a day or two after the wedding, without a fuss. But there was at least one beast, a friend who never stopped being a friend, who deserved to know that she was going.


	2. Chapter 2: A Prince from Far Away

**Chapter 2**

**A Prince from Far Away**

Far to the north from the Abbey of Redwall, there was a place of which few beasts in Mossflower were aware. It was northerly enough, at least, that the land had a dismal, foggy air, but not so far that there was not a spring and a summer. It was gently mountainous, as is typical in the Northlands. It was long settled. Much of the low parts had been cleared and plowed at one time or another, leaving a lot of bald grassy fields and patches of woodland, but the hills were cloaked in a graceful old conifer forest which had stood there for many centuries, quietly watching the doings of beasts.

It was watching when King Mortspear came through here long ago. He called this place Vale Duresse—a troublesome valley. It was not so troublesome as to be unconquerable, however. The forest watched him descend from the north, from who knows where. It watched the waters turn red. The eyes of beheaded creatures stared at it, and it stared back. Finally, the wildcat built a lodge on a summit, and then a granary, and then some walls. And then he left, except to return once in a while to collect food, or stone, or soldiers, or smiths. Once, he came to collect his issue. A princess.

He conquered the place so thoroughly that, even long after his death, the keep still stands, and the locals call it Mont Royal, for there were not many hills around that ever housed a king. The second oldest structure in the valley was the church where sacrifices were made to him, and tribute gathered.

It was some weeks now that a stranger came to Duresse, from the west, from who knows where, and did his best to burn the church down. He wore a ring of Mortspear.

The church didn't burn entirely. The portion of it that was made of wood was easy enough to destroy. The walls made of stones had been brought down with battery. The copse of trees around it had been felled. But the heart of it, the stone sanctum with its beehive roof, still stood.

A small group of beasts were gathered there, several of them bundled in striped or tartan shawls. These were locals, but there were some strangers there too, part of the retinue that the apparent prince had brought with him from the west. No matter their origin, every beast there watched with anxiety as the wildcat circled a pile of tools in the former churchyard.

Lucivane de Nocto was an uncommon beast. Most wildcats were the color of earth or wood, but this one was golden. He was not a hulking brute of a warlord, and needed no belt of skulls or kilt of skins to intimidate others. He was a prince. Primly clothed from neck to foot in black, he appeared sinister and luminous as a full moon. He had the awful eyes of his kind, pale green, sometimes slitted like a snake, sometimes unnervingly full and round. To goodbeasts, he looked like a nightmare. Vermin tended to assume he had seer powers.

He beckoned to a stoat of his who had been sitting on a tree stump, lazily chewing on a twig. The stoat came forward, pulled off his cap, and held it forth to the prince. Lucivane divested himself of his rings. He gave the stoat his sword and his black coat, leaving him in a white shirt and breeches. From the pile the wildcat chose a tool of dark iron that was like a very long chisel or pick. The farmers used it to break up inconvenient rocks in their fields. He drew it like an elegant rapier and gave it an approving look.

He lifted the tool above his head and drove it into the church steps in a powerful stroke. The stone cracked. A wild grin spread on the cat's face and he did it again and again, eventually splitting the stone in two. The onlookers drew astonished breaths, and some chewed on their hats, and some held their heads in their paws in despair at seeing the ancient structure crumble.

"Something like this will do," Lucivane said, straightening himself. He looked at the stoat. "Fleetclaw, did you summon the blacksmith?"

A blanketed mole stepped forward from the crowd. "Oi be 'ere, yer 'ighness."

The prince tossed the chisel at him. The mole caught it in both paws with some effort, as it was too long for his frame.

"Something like that," Lucivane said again. "For large foxes or ferrets. And me. Bigger, with a handle."

"Yes, Sir." The mole bowed his head. "Bit loike un old moining pick."

The prince donned his clothes again, and the foreign party left the natives to their confusion or sadness. Lucivane and his vermin trekked back up the hill to the old fort, Mont Royal, where they had taken up residence.

It was an old and not particularly grand assembly of structures. This was an outpost of the former kingdom. Most of the way up, there were stone steps, here and there an architectural flourish, a gargoyle or a viewing deck. The defense wall ran irregularly, following the idiosyncrasies of the land. Beyond it was a small complex of buildings, the largest of which was the lodge, the main hall and residence. Only the lodge was visible from without the wall, as a cascade of boldly peaked roofs like the hulls of several ships fused together. It was poorly maintained. No cat had lived there for some thirty seasons or so.

The steps routed them into a walled vestibule, at the end of which was the main gate, a portal twice the height of the largest beasts, with carvings on either side that resembled the faces of grimacing cats. Another wildcat, a bespectacled female, waved to them from atop the wall as they passed. When they were inside, Lucivane gave leave to the others and joined her. The wall was not so tall on the inside as outside, on account of the hill. To get atop it was a jog up a short flight of stairs, and in some places only an earthen slope.

Amis was looking through the ramparts out over the vale, chin in paws. She was a little drunk.

"You're back, cousin! Sit, sit!" she shoved a flask of wine at him. "Fancy a drink?"

Lucivane sniffed it. "Where did you get this?"

"'S a gift from the locals. For their new prince."

"Amis, I did not take you for a fool. What if it's poisoned?"

She snickered. "It's not! I made Hicham drink it first!"

Lucivane looked grim. "Let me see you drink once."

"How hurtful, cousin." She took a pull, then passed it to him. Mischievously, she even stuck out her tongue to show that it was stained purple.

Lucivane drank and sighed deeply. "I broke the stone at last," he said, peering out towards the church. "It won't be long now that I pull the place down for good."

"Aye, I saw from the glass. Tell me, what did you have to gain from taking away something those beasts loved, eh? We could have made a comfortable home here, no contest. I'm sure many of 'em hate us now."

He scoffed as he passed the wine to her. "I'll live. It's my land and I shall do as I wish. Anyway, they know not what they love."

"Oh? Have you had a vision?"

"Quiet!" Lucivane looked around slowly. Once he was assured that no one was within earshot, he continued. "I was unable to sleep that night. I went outside, to walk around on that landing down there with the columns."

"A _colonnade_," Amis corrected.

"Shut up, Amis."

She cackled.

"I heard a voice," Lucivane said. "I saw my mother in the trees. 'Twas she, told me to burn the church down. And come dawn, I did."

Amis was mid-swig when he said this. She sputtered, and then carefully set the flask down. "Aye? What did she look like?"

"Like _my mother_," Lucivane repeated, irritated at the inane question.

"Are you sure it was her? Exactly her? It was not...a witch's trick? Or some evil spirit in the woods, imitating her?"

"Possible," said Lucivane. "I can't recall. I've not seen my mother in ages. Hellsgate knows where she is now-probably raising her umpteenth spawn-but I doubt she's got anything to do with this place. Why should I have a vision of her? Do some reading. Maybe the answer is in your lorebooks."

"If I never touch a book again, I will be happy," grumbled Amis. "I was in that tower all those seasons up to my whiskers in books and scrolls, and, and _charts_. Ooh I hated the charts. Can't I just follow you around with a polearm or a cutlass? I could be a real intimidating henchbeast, you know. Just ghastly."

"I'll not waste you like that. You are the closest thing I have to a seer." He stood heavily, as if he was bearing a boulder in his lap.

"Learning is no replacement for sight. We are both one-half of a seer, you and I. You are the owl, and I merely a clever bat." She watched him for a moment as he wobbled, a paw on the rampart for support. "Are you quite alright, Nocto?"

"Fine. Just fine. This house is so musty I cannot breathe sometimes."

"But we're outside."

"Just do your job, Amis!" He took a struggling breath in. "I can't sand this place. Can't believe I journeyed so far for this stinking, rotten hovel. I'm going out for a hunt."

"The lads won't be happy about that," Amis observed. "They've been out in the sun all day. Shall I come with you?"

Lucivane gave her a steely look.

Amis let out a nervous chuckle. "Lemme rephrase that. _I think_, you should have someone with you. In case your mother decides to make an encore, or your brother's laundress or your grandmother's mistress or whatever. Come. I'm not drunk enough to walk off the mountain, I don't think."

She joined him and hooked her arm to his, giving him a bit of support as they descended the stairs from the wall top

* * *

**Time for some author notes. ****Thank you all for the lovely reviews, first of all. **

**Waycaster: It's a good thing then that I was not intending it to be Latin, or to mean baby. It's a made up word, a play on Infanta, the Spanish title of princess. The actual male form is Infante, but psshh, details.**

**One-eye: I hope this wildcat chapter lives up to your expectations. **

**Grey Coincidence: Thank you for the detailed review. I'm glad Nadine came off as sympathetic. **


	3. Chapter 3: I Make Life Soft

**Chapter 3 **

**I Make Life Soft**

The gatehouse had not been tidy in nearly twenty seasons, thanks to its sole inhabitant and current recorder of Redwall, Brother Jacko. Despite being the son of a skipper—as he is quick to remind others—the otter had found his calling not in leadership or fighting, but in scholarship. The last three cohorts of Redwall dibbuns had been taught their letters by him. Not that they were ever really thankful for it. Literacy was not particularly useful to the vast majority of abbeydwellers once they were out of the abbey school.

On the eve of Byron's wedding, he wasn't present at Great Hall, to share in the high spirits. Nadine looked for him carefully among the great and varied horde of beasts supping there. The long tables overflowed with creatures she didn't know or hardly knew, and many more occupied the lawns outside, gathering round lanterns or fires in the cool twilight despite the impressive population of spring insects.

Guessing that the otter was still in the gatehouse, Nadine took him a tray from the kitchen: a pot of mint tea for the two of them, a salad of wild greens, and crusty bread with hotroot sauce. It was best to take him things that could last a while. Jacko could not be relied upon to eat anything in a reasonable amount of time-food became chilly or soggy waiting for him to finish a sentence, then a page, then a chapter. She tapped on the door before backing it open, and found him as usual bent over something on his table that was a mess of open scrolls and folios. Around him, upon the floor and on the shelves was much the same: a labyrinth of paper.

Every time a beast questioned him as to whether this was an appropriate way to store valuable records, he would reply that he was "reorganizing". He had been reorganizing for at least as long as Nadine had been alive.

"Evening," he said, without looking up. He squinted fiercely to read in the candlelight. Jacko was tall and narrow and had a permanent stooping posture. He could have been handsome as a youngbeast. But now, with a softening belly, he was beginning to blend in with the older ranks of Redwall's lay males, the ones that drank a little too much and whose children had children. The gatehouse aged a beast prematurely.

"Evening, Jacko," said Nadine. "Brought you supper."

She set the tray on one of the armchairs by the fire. Every other surface was cluttered. Having poured herself a cup of tea, she settled into the other armchair, pulled her aching feet up. She loved the gatehouse. It was always a quiet, if disharmonious, haven. For a brief time as a dibbun, she came here every day to train as Jacko's assistant. She couldn't recall why she stopped. She hadn't the patience for letters, she supposed. Perhaps she ought to have stuck with the job anyway. There was plenty of gilded romance to devour in the pages, and it was not a bad substitute for the real thing. It would have kept her out of trouble.

"I shall miss it, this gatehouse," she said. "I don't believe any other place in the Abbey is allowed to be so uniquely dysfunctional."

"You'll miss it?"

"Yes." Nadine sat up proudly. "You see, I'm leaving Redwall. For good. I'm going to go into Mossflower to start over, and find a life of my own."

"Ah. Because of Byron, is it?" Jacko gave her the kind of look that she despised, the kind that said he wasn't taking her seriously, that she was a child acting out. "A pity you don't get married first. The number of young mice out there is thin, I hear. There aren't many large settlements of mice in general. I can't even think of one off the top of my head. That's why they all end up here, at one point or another, if only to find a spouse. You'll be very lonely."

"Marriage," grumbled Nadine.

"I suppose the Guosim could adopt you," he pondered, as he came to the fire and poured himself some tea. "Or my uncle, the Skipper of the lower Moss. You'd have to learn to pull your weight, though. That's not a soft life."

At this, Nadine took a deep breath to contain herself. She found she could not. "A soft life? Now you listen here, Jacko Micklemere. You see your dinner there? I made it. I helped cook in the kitchens tonight. Tomorrow, I'm to get up at the crack of dawn to bake with the Friar-while you're still snoring-and then I'll scrub the breakfast dishes. After they put the tables up, I'm scrubbing the floor. Then we'll be sewing a border at the last minute onto the hem of that bride's stupid dress. _Then_ I'm to go crawling through the gardens in the afternoon, to uproot a dozen baskets of emergency carrots and parsnips and onions for the feast, or else to mind unruly dibbuns while someone else does it! At the end of the day, I still have to show up to that ludicrous wedding looking fresh and carefree and festive." She got to her feet and jabbed him in the chest. "You, _Sir_, cannot even seem to look presentable—ever—despite being left alone all day to do whatever you want, and having all your meals served to you, and having your clothes made and washed and mended for you. I pull my weight. I earn my keep. Don't you talk to me about a soft life. _I make life soft for you_."

Jacko took a long sip of his tea to disguise whatever emotion was on his face. He cleared his throat. "Yes. Fine. I misspoke. Is that what you want to hear? Thank you for supper, my erstwhile pupil."

There was an icy pause. Nadine said, "I've not told anyone else. Just you. I want to go without anyone else knowing, after this wedding mess. I can't possibly leave now, or the others will resent me forever for dropping my share of work."

"So you are going? Really?"

"I am." Every time Nadine said it, she felt more sure.

Jacko gazed at her sad-eyed. "Why must you? There are many here who love you, you know."

"I am not sure they do. If you'd heard what they said to me earlier..."

"My dear, beasts talk about each other. They gossip. Sometimes they are cruel with their words. That's just a part of life. That does not mean they love you any less. You've been here since you were a pup. You're one of us."

"Do you remember my mother?" Nadine said.

Jacko looked at his feet.

"She was not one of us. A dishonorable beast. Unwed. They all think I'll end up like her. It's gotten so bad since Byron." Nadine shook her head. "I'll not hear any more argument. I'm going, and that's that."

She thought she saw evidence of a tear in the otter's eyes. For the life of her she did not know why she was so attached to this ungainly creature, but she would miss him deeply.

Suddenly, he said, "Did you know Sister Harriet is back?"

Nadine did not understand the change in conversation. "Oh. How nice."

"For the wedding," Jacko said, pointedly. "Knowing her, she'll be eager to get out into the field again after it's over."

His meaning dawned on her. "You think...I should go with her?"

"Indeed. She usually takes a companion or two. Why not? It would get you away from the Abbey, and in a much less, er, dramatic fashion than what you had in mind. Last I heard, she was exploring in the southern deserts or thereabouts. I was to go see her in the morning about translating something, but let's pay her a visit now, eh? I'll wager she's still up. Why, half the abbey will drink itself silly tonight, and she'll be among them..."

For the first time, Nadine felt true hope and excitement about the notion of getting out of Redwall. With the worldly Sister Harriet, she could travel to the most exotic places, have adventures, meet the dignitaries of strange lands. It was too good to be true. "Do you think she'd have me? Really? But she's a close friend of Bryon's, isn't she?"

A smirk spread across the otter's face. "I'll let you in on a secret, my dear. As hard as it is to believe, there are some beasts in this world for whom my friendship trumps Byron's."

Sister Harriet was fortunate to have a room to herself indoors. Many of Byron's veritable army of wedding guests were sleeping as a crowd in cavern hole, or even camped out on the lawns or outside the walls. When Nadine and Jacko arrived at the little dormitory room, bearing the night's second pot of tea, the squirrel was busy unpacking wonders from her trunk.

She showed Nadine a vase. It was cracked and faded, but the beautiful colors of it were still apparent: robin's egg blue and ochre and ivory-white. Intricate and ancient scenes of mouse maidens picking lilies and irises ran around it. Nadine turned it this way and that, enthralled by the lush figures prancing through the same task she had been doing earlier in the day. They seemed to be doing it with much greater significance.

"That's going to be my wedding gift to ol' Ronnie," Harriet said. "Not very functional anymore, but a lovely decorative piece. What do you think, my dear?"

Her dark eyes reflected the light of the candle in her lantern. She was dressed in a fine silk robe over her nightgown. No plain abbey robes for her, though she was technically a part of the order. Nadine didn't know how old the sophisticated squirrel was, only that she must be younger than Jacko, because she had once been his assistant as well.

Nadine replied, "It's amazing."

"It's from the desert?" Jacko inquired.

"Southsward. I cannot tell you how beautiful Southsward is. I rescued it from the ruins we found of a large building, a primitive castle maybe, a little northwards of the current palace."

"Admirable," said Jacko.

"Ready to see something a little more racy, Skip?" Harriet asked gleefully. It was her little joke, that nickname—Skipper of the Gatehouse.

Jacko shook his head. "Oh dear. I don't know if I have the strength."

Harriet pulled a wrapped parcel from the trunk. Delicately she began to undo the ties. "Now this one would be too grotesque a wedding present, I'm afraid."

Nadine gasped. It was a small statue of a corpulent female rat, breastfeeding a child. She took it from Harriet gingerly. The statue was cut artfully from some black stone, faceted, so that it was afire even in the dim candlelight. It was a glimpse into another world. Nadine thought there was wisdom in the thing's face. Dour, but gentle wisdom.

"Goodness," said Jacko disapprovingly.

"I found it in a cave, can you believe it?" Harriet said. "Also in Southsward, not far from those ruins. Just sitting there. I suppose, where there are goodbeasts, there must be vermin."

"Quite," said Nadine, passing the statue back. Her fingers felt grimy from it, and, perhaps subconsciously recalling the rat from earlier, she pulled his handkerchief out from her pocket and wiped her paws with it.

Harriet grabbed her wrist. "Nadine. Where did you get that?"

Nadine looked at it uncertainly for a moment, and then decided it was best to tell the truth in this situation. Harriet was an adventurous beast, after all. She wouldn't judge. "Erm. I got it off a rat."

"What?" Jacko sputtered. "My child! You consorted with vermin?"

"I did not _consort_, thank you. He attacked me today while we were out. I sort of got separated from the group...but I handled him! He ran away." Nadine watched Harriet gaze intently at the scrap of cloth, hold it up to the light. "Is it important?"

"Tartan," replied Harriet. "It came from the Northlands. This is excellent weaving. Unique colors. I've never seen blue and orange. It could very well have belonged to an important beast. I should like to see it in the sunlight, once I unpack my magnifying glass. Mind if I keep it?"

"Of course you can," replied Nadine. "I'm sorry, I didn't know that it was of value."

"Valuable things don't always look valuable at first. You should have seen that vase when I found it. You'll have to cultivate an eye for things, Nadine, if you're going to be my assistant."

"I will, Ma'am. I swear it."

"And tomorrow," Harriet went on, "Before the wedding, you will take me to where you saw this rat."

"No."

"No?" Harriet looked up from the cloth, a storm beginning to form in her eyes. Nadine was alarmed, but fought the urge to backpedal. Tomorrow could not be compromised.

"After the wedding, I can," Nadine said slowly. She had the impression of trying to talk down some great beast that was determined to drag her off. "I have too much to do tomorrow. Fully booked, me. Ha ha."

"But this is urgent," Harriet said smoothly. "That rat might not be around for long. If we wait another day, we may miss him. I am _deeply_ curious to find out where this came from, you understand."

Nadine looked helplessly towards Jacko, hoping that he would perhaps offer to take on some of her work, so that she could have some time to spare. He merely stared back at her, waiting for her response to Harriet.

_Jacko, as thick as ever_, thought Nadine. It occurred to her that she could simply tell them where she had run into the rat, and leave them to go find him. But, that wouldn't do. This was too exciting. She had to be in the thick of things, herself. She had to go with Harriet.

"Alright," said Nadine. "Tomorrow, before noon. I'll get away somehow."

* * *

**Author's Notes: A longer chapter this time. Thank you again for your reviews, Grey and Waycaster. They are much appreciated. **


	4. Chapter 4: Day of Union, Part 1

**Chapter 4**

**Day of Union, Part 1**

The magical day arrived at Redwall. The day when male and female would unite. The day when two beasts would fulfill the obligations set upon them at birth, from the very moment their genders could be discerned. The day which carried the promise of more children, and manifested the dreams of elders. A day full of duty and love. Not the love between the two beasts concerned, mind, but the love lavished upon them by others who needed desperately to see their way of life continue as it always had. That love was far more important.

Nadine began this day weeping into her pillow, much to the irritation of the other maids she shared a room with. She soon gathered herself because she was due in the kitchens for morning duty. Her breakfast rolls had the honor of being first to go in the oven, the first of a hundred breads the kitchens would turn out that day. Once lit, the ovens would not rest until dark.

As she shaped the balls of dough, she thought about how she could possibly sneak out with Harriet that morning. What duty could she defect, that would not anger everyone? The sewing, probably. She would make time, she resolved. If she just went a little faster with everything else, surely she could materialize hours out of nothing...

She finished doing the rolls at top speed. She took her turn at dishes, could not do as many as she ought to. She smiled apologetically at the vole maid who was up next, who balked at what was left. Heart pounding, Nadine jogged to fetch a pail and went up the stairs to join the beasts cleaning great hall, and set to scrubbing. She made it there earlier than expected; she was making good time.

But noon drew closer, and she was still not done. She scrubbed and scrubbed. Her fingers began to pulse from the exertion and the anxiety. A pair of insolent red feet stepped into her view, right on the flagstones she had just cleaned. Nadine looked up to see Harriet staring at her with amusement. The squirrel looked awake and lovely, in a lilac tunic and skirt.

"I believe we had an appointment," said Harriet.

Nadine looked down, ears flattened. "I can't. I am so sorry, but I just can't. There is so much left to do."

"Then leave it. Who cares if the floor isn't sparkling?"

"Sister Gertrude certainly will," Nadine grumbled, "and so will anyone who knows I am responsible."

"I did not take you for a weak creature who lives by the opinion of others. Is this the sort of maiden that Abbess Moraine raises?"

Nadine could only reply, "I am sorry that I disappoint you."

"Tell me where you saw the rat. I shall go find him myself."

"Yes, Ma'am."

Nadine felt a great burden lift off her shoulders once she told what she knew, and Harriet departed. Before long she was exactly where she ought to be, in the company of a pawful of other maidens, who sat in a circle, working on the hem of the bride's dress. It was a beautiful confection of rosy-pink, embroidered to the hilt with green vines and pink and white blooms. Nadine was deaf to the chatter of the others, for as her needle worked, questions filled her head. Had Harriet taken other beasts with her? Would she be safe on her own? What if the rat hurt her? It would be all Nadine's fault. She could not bear waiting all day for the squirrel to return with news.

_I should have gone with her_, Nadine thought uneasily.

When Lily, the bride, sat down with them to sew, Nadine would not make eye contact with her. But she was not very distressed about the presence of her beautiful and kind rival. She had much on her mind.

All day Nadine she did as she was bidden. Her head was buzzing in other worlds, while her paws worked without direction. In the garden she was digging parsnips out the ground, but could not recall when or how she had gotten there. Come evening she sat on her bed, her dress laid out neatly beside her, and chewed anxiously on her now-clean claws.

She missed the actual moment of Harriet returning, but she heard the talk soon enough. Harriet had brought home a rat in manacles.

Nadine pushed through the small crowd that had formed around the triumphant squirrel and her captive. The rat spared Nadine a glance, but only just. She could tell that he recognized her yet was somehow utterly unsurprised at her presence. He was bruised and bloody, and smelled terrible, so out of place compared to all the fresh abbeybeasts dressed in their finest. Anger bubbled within the mousemaid, though she understood little of what was happening. It all seemed wrong.

"Nadine, my wonderful new assistant!" said Harriet, grinning through a bloody lip. She too, stank of sweat and blood and the woods. "Would you do me a teensy favor and find a place to put him while I get cleaned up? You go with her, Jacko."

"Where would I find a place?" Nadine asked coldly, as the looming otter joined her. "You know every inch of the abbey is occupied. Downstairs he would get in the way, and upstairs there are no rooms."

"Then put him in the gatehouse for now. You'll have to miss Ronnie's vows to keep an eye on him, but I daresay you'll be happy to have the excuse."

Nadine and Jacko took the rat away. The creature was defeated in spirit. He didn't try to make a run for it, though his legs were not bound at all. Nadine almost wished he would. She would open the gate for him. If she thought enough about it, she knew that was an incomplete and dangerous plan, but her feet itched to run, too.

Jacko dug the key to the gatehouse from his habit and let them in. The rat sank to the ground, back against a wall, letting out a deep breath.

"Were you there, Jacko?" Nadine asked. "What happened?"

"He's not talking," Jacko whispered. "He won't say anything about who he is or where he got it."

Nadine was taken aback. "So she's just going to hold him prisoner? Over a stupid scrap of cloth? Look at the state he's in!"

"Clearly you don't know Harriet very well," Jacko said. "This is her life's work, you know. She brings us treasures and knowledge to fill our vault and library. She takes it very seriously." The otter lowered his voice. "Could I see you outside a moment?"

Nadine grudgingly followed him out. The otter continued at a whisper, "The thing is, that's not an ordinary vermin in there, my dear. He's a thinking one. Random bandits and vagrants are common as dirt in Mossflower, but we need to pay attention when a leader shows up, you understand? It's like casting a net, and pulling in a shark among all the fish. There's not supposed to be sharks in the river Moss. We need to know who he is, or who he works for, where he comes from. I rather think Byron will want to interrogate him tomorrow, after all this—you know—is over."

Nadine's stomach knotted in horror. She turned on her heel and walked away.

"Where are you going?" asked Jacko. "Don't leave me here with him!"

"I'm getting him something to eat!" she called angrily. "You just otter up for two minutes, will you?"

She returned with rosemary bread, a bit of brandy and a pitcher of water. "Seems you got those alms after all," she said dryly, as she set them down before the rat. He looked at her with a miserable expression and then toasted her silently with the cup of brandy, held between both bound paws. It was the first time tonight he'd looked her in the eyes, and she was alarmed at the amount of familiarity in their exchange. She held back tears. _What a day. What a positively _ludicrous_ day_, she thought.

"Cry a lot, do you?" the rat remarked. He sat back in a decidedly more relaxed posture and took another sip.

To her surprise, he was more than willing to wash up when she filled a bucket for him from the pond. The gatehouse had its own little fenced-off alcove outside, which Jacko euphemistically called 'the washroom'. As the rat was limited in the use of his arms, Nadine prodded Jacko into helping him bathe in a perfunctory way, and to get his wounds clean and dressed. They put him in one of Jacko's nightshirts. Of course, it was much too long for a rat, and the manacles prevented him from using the sleeves. He looked odd, armless in a long white gown, but his smell had improved greatly.

"Listen, rat," Nadine said to him. "Do you want to be freed? Tell us about yourself. Tell them who you are, and Harriet might let you go."

"The squirrel's a thief and not to be trusted," replied the rat.

"A thief?" said Nadine. "How so? You are the thief. You tried to steal from me."

"She's a thief of a much higher order, lass. Thief of relics. A _graverobber_. I'll not tell her ennythin'."

Jacko, who had been dutifully scribbling notes, said, "What preposterous accusations! I've known that squirrel from when she was a child."

"Aye? Are you the one what taught her the world is hers for the taking?" The rat watched Jacko's paw as if he wanted the quill to break. "You know me not. Don't write like you do. You will never be the great beast you dream of being, otter."

Jacko stared at him aghast. "I-I...wh...how..."

"For your information, rat, you are speaking to a Micklemere," Nadine cut in indignantly. "And he is a fine and gentle beast."

"That's right," said Jacko. "My father is—"

"Oh, have a father, do ya?" said the rat. Evidently the brandy had sharpened his tongue.

"I don't believe I ever heard your name," Nadine said. She crossed her arms expectantly. The rat did not respond.

Jacko said, "He had a ring with 'Tawnhide' written inside the band. Or, I think that's what it said. Northern letters are a bit different."

"He doesn't look very tawny to me," said Nadine doubtfully. "How did you see what was written on the inside, anyway? Did you take it from him?"

"Harriet confiscated it."

Nadine's mouth set in a grim line. "Jacko, you have helped her abduct a beast, do you understand? As far as we know he's just some thief, not even a successful one. And it's my fault that he's here! If he's harmed—."

"Don't be ridiculous, my dear. Of course he will not be harmed. This is _Redwall_. He _wishes_ his kind were as merciful as us. Why, if you were kidnapped by some vermin, they'd certainly not give you the good brandy and sit around talking."

An hour or so later, Harriet came by the gatehouse in high spirits. There was no trace of her former disheveled state, except a line of dry blood on her lip. She was neatly groomed and dressed to perfection, complete with gloves and a feathered cap.

"You did clean him up well," Harriet said, pleased at the sight of the tamed and somewhat ridiculous-looking rat. "I thought I would relieve you two. You've done so well, Nadine. The ceremony's over, but the feast is on. Go and eat."

Nadine was momentarily surprised at how little she cared about missing the entirety of Byron's wedding. That was an anthill of a problem when one had charge of a prisoner in handcuffs who ought not to be a prisoner, and whose safety could be entrusted to no one.

She said, "If it's all the same, Sister, I think we'll take Mister ah—Tawnhide with us to the hall. It wouldn't be the Redwall way to starve him."

"Oh?" said Harriet. "I doubt he would think twice about starving any number of us. Be thankful you're not the one in chains, little Nadine."

Nadine rolled her eyes. "I am_ beyond_ myself with thanks. All the same, I don't think it would offend anyone to have him in the hall, now that all the important bits are over." Before there were any other objections, Nadine hustled the rat out the door. Jacko sprinted to catch up.

Sister Harriet now stood in the gatehouse alone, observing the messy room with disapproval. Her attention landed on Jacko's table, on the empty tray of food and the empty water pitcher.

"What was that about?" the otter was asking, as he and Nadine rushed the rat towards Great Hall. "We fed him already."

"I don't want to leave him alone with her." Nadine whispered.

"Why not? Harriet is perfectly capable of defending herself. No ordinary maid, that."

Nadine scoffed. "Jacko, can I ask you something?"

"Hm?"

"We're good friends, I like to think. You sad yesterday that there are some beasts who care more about you than Byron. Well, if you had to choose between me and Harriet, who has your favor?"

Tawnhide let out an impatient little hiss.

"What a silly question, my dear," said Jacko.

"It is not silly, not if I am planning to do something at odds with her. Please tell me that I can trust you."

"You can always trust me," said Jacko. "Though I'd rather like to know what you have in mind."

Nadine caught Tawnhide's gaze. Now, the rat's eyes burned with deep interest. A keen and silent conversation passed between the two beasts. "Color me surprised, lass," he said finally.

"Will someone tell me what's going on?" asked Jacko.

* * *

**Author note: these two chapters were a bear to write, but also very fun. Started out as one, then eventually became so ponderous that I had to split it up. I've got a third in the pipeline, so hopefully that will be out by the next weekend. Thank you for the reviews as always, Grey and Waycaster. I should come by and review your stories sometime.**


	5. Chapter 5: Day of Union, Part 2

**Chapter 5**

**Day of Union, Part 2**

The hall was alight with hundreds of candles, and the good cheer of many beasts. They had not served the main course yet, but the tables heaved with food already: aromatic breads and pasties and great tureens of soup. At the head of the crowd of beasts sat the Abbey elders, and Byron and Lily like King and Queen. He in a spotless cream tailcoat, corded across the breast, and she in the pink cloud that had taken several paws several weeks to make. Even Tawnhide lost himself for a moment, and gaped at the sparkling scene.

"It's a Redwall feast," Jacko told the rat proudly.

"And here I thought you beasts of Mossflower didna hold with riches," said Tawnhide. "How profane. What does that mouse have? Land? Armies?"

"Well, er, because it's a wedding you see. Best day in a beast's life. No holds barred. Do rats have weddings?"

"Important ones do, aye."

"And have you ever been married, rat?"

"Hell's Gates! I've told you—I'm no' who yew think I am, ya fool creature. I'm just a pore, ordinary sot what came 'ere lookin' for warmer climes."

"An ordinary beast wouldn't use a word like profane, and certainly not in the way you just did," Jacko said. "Believe me, I've taught a great number of very stupid precious little ones. Now, if you'll excuse me. I need a drink."

The otter disappeared into the crowd. Beasts at the tables were packed shoulder-to-shoulder, so Nadine and Tawnhide hovered in the back where those with no seat milled about. The others gave them as wide a berth as possible. Nadine glanced at the head table and saw that Byron was looking her way. She looked away sharply.

"I like not the look of 'im," Tawnhide said.

"What's that?" Nadine asked.

"The prince. The one as you were lookin' at. He's full o' himself."

"Kind of you to say that. Now don't look too long at him. Don't draw attention to yourself."

"I am aware, lass. I know when I ought to be scared of a beast. I'd say you should warn his wife what she's in for, but she'll not listen. Not today. Think of this: aren't you lucky, to not be at his side? And aren't I lucky, to not have met his bride by the stream yesterday? I would have been shot six ways."

Nadine patted his fettered wrists, masked under the nightgown. "Not that lucky, I'm afraid. Er, did you manage to see how these things work?"

"No. Only that your squirrel didn't use a key. She moved bits about in such a way that it locks and unlocks. Sort of puzzle, seemed like."

"I detest puzzles," said Nadine.

"You think she'd loosen 'em if you asked her? Take them off to let me relieve meself? Then you could see how she does it."

"I don't think she's that stupid, or that kind," said Nadine. "We may have to figure it out ourselves. Come, I saw someone out there I want a word with."

On the lawns, the crowd was thinner. Torches lit up the paths, and beasts tended to group around the light, drinks and food in paw. Nadine circled around a bit and zeroed in on the beast she sought: a wrinkly, squinting old mousewife. "That's Goody Crossbrooks," whispered Nadine. "Poor vision. She's got a son who's a blacksmith."

Goody Crossbrooks peered at Tawnhide as the pair approached. "Ooh, what a pretty dress you've got! Lovely wedding, wasn't it?"

"Lovely wedding," Nadine agreed. Tawnhide nodded emphatically.

"I bet one of you will be next," the old mouse said.

"Fingers crossed. How's Boris doing, Ma'am?"

"Oh fine, fine. He didn't want to come today. 'Ma,' he says, 'I don't see what good it'll do me, watchin' others get hitched'. And I says, 'well if you'd come to the abbey, you could maybe meet a nice mousemaid yourself'." She looked Tawnhide up and down. "Like this fine, tall creature here. You'd be perfect for my Boris."

Tawnhide looked at his feet, and did what he did best: stayed silent.

"Doesn't say much, does she?" Goody said to Nadine.

"Oh. she's just shy."

The pleasantries went on and Nadine gallantly offered to walk the old mouse home after dinner. It was dangerous, after all, to be out alone at night. They could have a chat with lonely Boris the blacksmith when they got there. Nadine was eager to catch up. Nadine's pretty friend was eager to meet him.

In the crowded and noisy hall, Harriet found Jacko filling his tankard. She worked through the enormous, snaking line of beasts waiting for a drink. Beasts protested raucously as she cut by them.

"Jacko, you were supposed to be watching him," said Harriet, seething.

"Now my dear, is that any way to talk to your teacher?" He led her away from the kegs. "Relax, Nadine's got him. In this crowd, someone'll be watching them. She's perfectly safe."

Harriet scanned the hall. "Where did they go?"

Jacko found himself in the enviable position of having valuable knowledge. That was a rare thing for a recorder, who dealt in so much of the trivial. He could have said, as he quite certainly had seen, that Nadine and the rat went outside. He could even approximate the general direction they went off in. He could tell Harriet of the incriminating things the mousemaid had been saying all evening. He knew quite a lot, really. But at this moment, he chose not to play favorites between his students.

"Don't know." He shrugged.

Tawnhide was tolerating the odious conversation with the old mouse, when he began to prickle with the sensation of an enemy close at hand. The rat turned and saw a shape at the doors to the hall, paler than all the other shapes. Wordlessly, he left Nadine and melted into the darkness, just out of reach of the torchlight. Nadine continued speaking to Goody Crossbrooks for a while before she noticed that he'd disappeared. She looked around in alarm.

Byron was coming down the path towards her. He wore the sword, she noticed. Probably he was wearing it ceremonially, but all the same. It was the sword. She thought of that sword embedded in Tawnhide's neck.

"Why, I believe that's the bridegroom," said Goody.

"Come to compliment me on the flower arrangements, I bet," said Nadine. "Excuse me a moment."

It was hard to believe that not long ago she had looked into his face and saw her future. Now the expression was inscrutable, the brow furrowed. He was displeased. "What do you want?" snapped Nadine. "Go back to your bride! You've got a lot of nerve approaching me like this!"

"Where is he?" asked Byron.

"Hm?" said Nadine, tipping her head to the side innocently. She was stalling for time. She knew perfectly well who Byron was talking about.

"That rat. The one Harriet brought in. Where is he?"

Nadine made a show of looking around. "Oh dear...I don't know. I was just chit chatting with someone over there, and I—I suppose I lost track of him." She covered her face with her paws and started sobbing very convincingly. She'd had lots of practice.

"I'll have a word with the abbess about you, you irresponsible little-" Byron growled in frustration. "He could be anywhere on the grounds now!"

"Nadine!" called Harriet. She jogged up to them. She was one of those creatures who could jog perfectly well in a floor-length gown. Jacko was not far behind. "What's happening?" she huffed. "Where is he?"

"She lost him," explained Byron. "Now we'll have to suspend the festivities. The premises must be searched."

"Really, Byron?" Jacko asked. "It's your wedding day, and you're proposing to work?"

"We can't let him escape," said Byron. "Look here, I dreamed of him last night. Martin warned me of him."

Jacko and Harriet looked at him in astonishment.

"Then this is a very serious matter," Harriet agreed.

Jacko took another swig of ale and contemplated whether he had made an unforgivable mistake. He looked about to find that Nadine had gone. No one else took notice.

As to the whereabouts of the rat, he was currently shadowing Goody Crossbrooks, who had wandered off to view the magnificent Redwall gardens, which at this time were producing flowers as well as vegetables. They were proudly lit up as well, and beasts were politely listening to Sister Marianne, the head gardener, talk of her methods. Tawnhide knew that the old mouse was the key to his freedom, and he was determined to follow her home somehow. Even if Nadine was not there to vouch for him when he encountered the blacksmith, he was prepared to take the risk.

Unfortunately, he was not exactly invisible himself. And he was so focused on Crossbrooks that he did not notice the danger until there was a beast directly behind him. A young long patroller, in fact.

He was dragged to a quiet corner of the grounds.

They surrounded him: a brawny hare, an otter, a mouse, and a hedgehog. The hedgehog was somewhere in middle age. The others seemed to be young beasts, but not children. They were varying levels of drunk. The mouse was armed with a club. The hedgehog with a tankard. Tawnhide was quite the opposite of armed.

"Lost your chaperones, wot?" said the hare.

He could not escape, and could not fight, so he curled up and took the beating. The bandaged wounds and forming scabs burst open again. The hare was kicking him, and the mouse went at his back with the club. There was blood in his eye, and all was a flurry. If anyone happened to wander by, they did not help him. He closed his eyes and thought of home. Yes, the fog over the fields in the morning. The moors which went on forever. The low mountains full of ghosts.

When Nadine came upon them, having frantically circled the grounds looking for him, she found him beaten to a pulp, shirt covered in bloody speckle.

"Stop it!" she said. "What are you doing? Is this any way to behave?"

The hare, who was taking a break to give his mates a turn, looked at her. "Best be on your way, m'gel. No sight for a maid."

Nadine ran to Tawnhide and swung at the other mouse. It was the first time she had ever punched someone. She caught him in the jaw, and he stepped back, rubbing his face. The hare came and restrained her.

"There's a gel," he said kindly.

Nadine realized, to her horror, that she could not raise any alarm. If she did, Harriet and Byron would find them, and the rat would lose any chance of escaping. Tawnhide knew this too. Even he was doing his best to make as little noise as he could. But how long would these beasts keep at it?

_Would they kill him?_ Nadine wondered.

_Would they turn his brains to jelly?_

She didn't like the chances. She took a deep breath, and let out a scream as loud as her lungs could manage.


	6. Chapter 6: All I Do Is See

**Chapter 6**

**All I Do Is See**

A sensitive beast could taste wisdom in the valley's water. It was wise because it had traveled over the mountains and took a little of whatever it touched, but only a little at a time. As any seer worth her salt knows, the difference between knowledge and selfishness is a simple matter of quantity.

Lucivane stood at the edge of a stream. This particular stream flowed into the great Northvimer later on, but here it was called the Voloker, and it carried the water of the mountains. It gushed from a recent rain. Lucivane drank deeply of it.

"Help me," he told the stream.

There was a many-necked knot forming in his stomach for weeks now, almost from the moment he set foot in Mortspear's fort. Though he had tried all common remedies, nothing relieved it. That was of course because the problem was not entirely natural. The downside of visions is that they take a toll on the psyche. For Lucivane, the terminus of pain and strife was not just his mind, but his body.

The wisdom of the mountain waters, as it turned out, was also incapable of curing him.

He killed a swan on his hunt that evening. It was not hard to kill a large beast if one had a bow and arrows. One simply shot it, and followed, and waited. It was harder to bring the thing home for the table. It took the strength of both Lucivane and Amis, and the assistance and cleverness of a couple other beasts, to bear the massive bird up the hill, strapped to a pole. Two arrows poked from its snowy body, dripping a trail of blood all the way to the roasting spit. Beasts marveled and cheered at the first sight of the bizarre trophy, but ate reluctantly that night. The rats in the wildcat's crew, with their picky rodent noses, were most keenly aware of their master's misery written in the meat. They were afraid. The other vermin sensed this fear and became uncomfortable. It was a silent dinner.

There were tartans present in the yard of the lodge that evening. They sat together, as locals tended to do when they visited within the walls. Valpin, who was chieftain of the tribe of foxes that lived in the hills, was there. Kester, a large river shrew and unofficial head of the village below the church, tucked into her meat happily. And lastly there was an old vixen who lived alone somewhere deep in the forest. It was rumored that she, Harpess, was a witch, though both Amis and Lucivane doubted that was true. She was simply a beast who had a penchant for dramatic dress, for wearing a lot of bark and bone. Had they encountered a true witch, they would have gone running back west. A seer was no match for a witch, nor was a chieftain nor any mundane warlord with an army. Even Mortspear would think twice.

Lucivane did not know who invited the occasional local representative to his table. It was probably Amis who made such wise choices. And it paid off. Thanks to the shrew, the ancient lodge was being cleaned and repaired, and the fox's deference meant that no other of his kind would hunt around Mont Royal. Lucivane acknowledged the three by raising his goblet. They hailed him likewise.

At night, once the lamps and torches were put out, the darkness of his chamber suffocated him. He slept but briefly, and dreamt of something watching him from the rafters. When he opened his eyes, it was not gone. The darkness moved in angular shapes—as if an elbow here, a knee there. But all together, there were too many joints. At times it coiled instead, like a snake. At times, he saw long fingers.

Lucivane fled outside once more, as he had done on many a night since he came here. This time, Amis was outside, too. She had her long glass out as if to look at the stars, but they both knew she was really waiting for him. She cleaned her spectacles with a cloth.

"The same trouble, Nocto?"

"Something wants me dead."

"Aye, cousin. Then let's tonight see its face."

Lucivane tried his best to keep breathing. "Oh I have seen it, I'm sure. All I do is see. Trouble is, I know not what I am seeing. Is it a vision, or is it a ghost? Does it come from within, or exist without?"

"Then allow me to call Hicham," said Amis.

"Your student?"

"He has been able to talk to spirits before. I know you'd rather no one know about this, ah, problem, but at least then we could guess the nature of the thing."

Hicham was a ferret, a handsome and sleek little devil who had long been a favorite of Amis'. He was afraid of nothing, which was a necessity when one's mistress was a wildcat and a seer. When Amis returned to Lucivane, the ferret was in tow, jogging to keep pace with her. He was toting the supplies: a book and bell and various other things.

The three of them returned to Lucivane's chamber, which was still and felt hollow. It was a sparse room, with only a bed and wardrobe. Though it was the best one in the lodge, which is to say it was the least damp, it had no warmth, no life, no presence of the wildcat that slept in it, for Lucivane hated being there. The floors were bare stone; he had not even bothered to call for a rug.

Hicham directed Lucviane to eat a bit of gray powder.

"Ash?" he asked, once he had tasted it.

The ferret replied cheerfully, "Bone ash, sir. Luckily, the mistress had me add in the swan yew killed t'day. Should be a good sho—er, I mean, strong results."

They sat in a circle on the floor. At the center was a lamp, an old clay one where the holes were arranged eerily like a face, two eyes and a grieving mouth. Hicham lit the wick and cleared his throat to announce that he was beginning. He rang the little bell he had, for bells are heard in all worlds.

Lucivane felt his throat stir.

Hicham began his mollifications. "Be still, Misto, yew are not needed here. Be still, Vulpuz, we trespass not in yer lands. Be still, Tare, we shall not seek t' alter yer book. Be still, Putorious, for our interference is a pinprick to yer realm..."

One always did one's best not to bother the rulers of the afterlife. The list went on for some time. Hicham was fastidious in including as many names as he could, culled from the stories of many different types of beasts. Inevitably there were redundancies, as some of these mighty beings were said to perform the same function. But in this situation, overlaps were far preferable to gaps.

"I call upon that spirit which inhabits this keep, if indeed there be one," said Hicham. "Make yerself known, creature."

There was silence, and then the hairs of Lucivane's back stood on end. He thought he heard claws upon the flagstone behind him.

Hicham's eyes watered. "Don't turn around, Highness."

Lucivane glanced at Amis. Her eyes were wide, and fixed on the thing behind him. Her paw gripped his tightly.

"Aye, I will not look."

A lesser beast would have been unable to suppress the urge to turn, but Lucivane was sensible. In his life as an instinctive seer, he had witnessed many horrific visions. He had no desire to see more.

"It is a cat," Amis whispered, "or something that was once a cat."

"What does it want?" Lucivane asked. "Does it speak?"

Hicham continued to focus on the point behind Lucivane's shoulder. "It says it wants yew, Nocto, to leave. Because it doesn't recognize yew. Because..." The ferret clammed up.

"Go on."

"Forgive me, sir. It says that yew are an impostor."

Lucivane heard the final word in the apparition's own voice, as a chilling growl in his ear.

_Impostor._

* * *

**A/N: Major points to anyone who can guess what line out of the original series Tare is based on. As far as I know, Vulpuz, too, is only mentioned once, but throwing his name in was a quick way to give proper context to the things Hicham was saying.**

**Thank you Grey and Waycaster for the reviews as always. **


	7. Chapter 7: Invisible Horizon

**Chapter 7**

**Invisible Horizon**

The last time Sister Harriet had seen the blue and orange, she was at a market in the Northlands several seasons ago. What town was it, now? Ah—

Bristlowth.

A gloomy seaside market town, but rather a busy one, for the Northlands. Most of that place was a backwater. Pretty sometimes, but dull as rocks. The town was a refreshing change of pace. One could get a decent meal and a drink. Boats of all sizes and descriptions crowded the harbor, hailing even from places Harriet had never gone to herself, like the lands across the Eastern Sea. You could not tell which was pirate and which was trader. Foxwake Castle loomed over them like a hunkering badger. Any substantial town in the Northlands was ruled over by a vermin, for woodlander chieftains preferred lives of bucolic isolation. Yet vermin lords never lasted long. There was too much fighting among them, fighting which inevitably destroyed the towns and any shred of prosperity they managed to build. There was nothing comparable to Southsward in the North. The vermin were victims of their own disorderly nature, and the gentlebeasts refused to rule. Oh, for a good squirrelking!

Harriet was there pursuing a manuscript by the Monk of Shardmoth for Redwall's expanding library. The town was known to have a good trade in antiquities. She met up with a book collector, a shrew named Lorkin? Lorcas? Something like that. That was when she noticed the rats roaming the articles market in groups of two and three. Many of them wore something like a cravat or neckerchief—in bright blue-and-orange tartan. They stopped here and there, examining the offerings of different stalls. The sellers stepped aside when approached by one of these beasts, and kept their eyes downcast.

She asked Lorcas who they were. Surely the fox's lot would not take such an interest in the market?

The shrew was uncomfortable._ "We call them inspectors, but they're not from 'round here. Don't know where they came from. Lord Redshanks says we're to let them search our wares if they want."_

_"What are they looking for?"_

_"Word is they're looking for things stolen from the tomb of Mortspear. But you needn't worry, Sister. I haven't anything like that."_

_"The King, Mortspear? Father of Verdauga Greeneyes?"_

_"I see his fame has stretched beyond the North. Aye, it's the same one. His tomb was robbed, oh, a few seasons ago. I hear there are a number of relics still missing."_

Presently at Redwall, Sister Harriet sat at the Abbess' window ruminating on this memory. Feeling victorious that she surfaced an answer to something that had puzzled her awhile, she smiled to herself.

"What state is he in?" asked the Abbess. They gathered in her private room, an incomplete assemblage of abbey leadership: Byron, Jacko, Harriet, and Abbess Moraine. The abbess, a tall mouse of middle seasons and proper bearing, often met beasts in her own room. She preferred to keep small company. Tidy bookshelves surrounded them, and a fresh pot of tea sat on her table.

"Not bad," said Byron. "Tough little monster. The worst thing was the way he was cuffed, he happened to dislocate his arm. He'll recover well."

"Good," she said. "Or perhaps that is not good, depending on how you interpret Martin's words. Stop writing, Jacko." She turned to the otter. "Pass me what you have of the dream."

Jacko turned back a page and slid it over to her. The abbess read it aloud in her clipped and authoritative voice, the perfect pause after every sentence.

"_This from account of Byron Meriff, Champion:_

_On the eve of my wedding-day did Martin the Warrior visit me in my dream. He cautioned me of a verminous spirit. Like him, a warrior long dead. It would come before the abbey in the form of a rat and take me away to the North where a great foe, a wildcat I think, awaits me. There was poetry, but I do not recall much of it. I heard the next day that such a rat had been captured, but I did not remember my dream until I laid eyes on the beast at my wedding feast_."

Harriet snorted. "You make him sound so foolish, Skip." Byron glared at Jacko.

"I can revise it if you wish," said the otter, shrugging.

"I should not care if he was pummeled to death or thrown off the belfry or drowned in hotroot soup," said Byron to the abbess. "I don't trust that rat, not one bit."

"But that is certainly a prophetic dream," Abbess Moraine replied. "Maybe the harbinger is not so pleasant a creature, but it did seem to you that Martin was dispensing prophecy? And the rat is to guide you to a warlord, not hinder you? There is no need to think of him as your enemy."

Byron nodded sullenly.

Jacko cut in, "Martin sends prophetic dreams when Redwall is in trouble. It does not make sense to travel to a warlord who has nothing to do with us."

"On the contrary, Jacko. Think of when Joseph the Bellmaker traveled to Southsward," said the Abbess. "That had very little to do with Redwall. We cannot choose where we are needed."

"Perhaps the warlord will come for Redwall in the future, and this is an opportunity to stop him early," said Harriet.

"Preventative measures are the most effective," agreed Byron. "We've seen that over and over again. Mossflower has never been safer."

Harriet replied, "Oh, quit the stern leader act! This could be it, Ronnie. Your destiny."

"And haven't you waited long, child?" The abbess chuckled. "Thirty-and-two and married before your first real journey!"

Jacko squirmed uneasily. "Don't tease him, Abbess. You and I are well beyond thirty-and-two and have yet to set one foot outside Mossflower."

"I think we ought to keep this business between ourselves for now," the Abbess went on. "Byron, you are permitted to tell your wife. Give her time to adjust to the idea of your leaving, but let no one else know. And do post a proper guard on him first thing in the morning. Jacko has volunteered to watch him for now, though I don't think he'll give us much trouble in the state he's in. We shall learn more from him when he wakes."

Once the group parted, Sister Harriet went immediately to her own room to take stock of every object that was there. Nothing struck her as being very special. Nothing that could come from the tomb of a king. Just some pottery and the little statue and the few books, of no distinguished age, that she had brought from the South. She'd not done a run in the North for several seasons. Even if she unknowingly picked up some treasured relic, it seemed unlikely that anyone should have traced it all the way south or east beyond Mossflower, and then back to Redwall. No, it was quite impossible.

But to be safe, she paid a visit to her assistant, a capable young hedgehog named Umbert, who came to his door half-asleep, rubbing his eyes. She ordered him to watch the infirmary for the night. He was to stay out of sight, but report to her if the rat made any movements.

* * *

As usual, he chose to be under the trees that overlooked the graveyard. That picture came to him easily. He woke in the grassy copse, and all was tinted yellow from the strong memory of a sunset. The air filled with music, a confident tremolo which would have been mesmerizing—to any creature who had not heard it a thousand times. It was a furious tempo this time.

"Tawnhide," said the rat as he opened his eyes. "Quiet, I beg yew."

The ferret ended his bit with a discordant note. He was a big, magnificent beast, and he held an equally magnificent lute of enormous size. He bared his fangs to the rat. Lightning raged in his black eyes. "My servant, are you not angered? They be treatin' ye like dirt under their feet. Let us out! Let us avenge yew!"

"Yew do flatter us," the rat replied gamely. "I'm alreet, as ye kin see."

"The mission draws close, rat. Nothing will keep us from 'im now. Let us out!" The ferret materialized a spear, dismissing his lute. A crick of blood ran down the leaf, round his paw, and down his wrist.

"No need t' get murderous. I reckon that's a good way t' get us killed in this place. Give us a day. I'll be gan."

A sound, like the creaking of wind upon a house, came uncomfortably close. The rat looked around. "That's strange. Weren't me doin'."

"Nor mine," said Tawnhide. "'Tis the mouse. Yew slipped into sleep, lad. He tries to invade yer dreams, the presumptive creature."

"Kin you hold 'im long, Master?"

The ferret gave a contemptuous, full-fanged grin. "I can do him one better. Wake up, lad."

* * *

Nadine was a light sleeper.

In her dream, she stood in front of the famed tapestry of Martin the Warrior. The hall could use a good dusting. White specks floated around her in the sunrays, fat as snowfall. One of these landed on the noble nose of the mouse on the wall. Martin the Warrior sneezed.

"Oh, sorry," said Nadine. "I'm afraid I skipped this room this morning."

"Not a problem," the warrior replied.

"Whatever are you doing in that tapestry? Won't you come in?"

Raising a leg, he took a step out of the brilliant weave. Treads stretched and tore as he pushed through, leaving a mouse-shaped hole behind. Finally he floated from the wall and came to kneel on the ground, holding his sword point-down to the floor. "I thank you."

"What a shame," Nadine said at the shredded tapestry, tucking her paws into her pockets. "It was fine weaving. Must've taken a lot of work to make that."

"Nadine of Redwall!" boomed the shining warrior. "Look where needs looking!"

She obliged him, though annoyed. "I am Nadine of Chippenley, Sir, for that is where my mother comes from."

"You have not once set foot in the village of Chippenley. You are Nadine of _Redwall_, and you are an interference. Listen to my word—

_Deep in the rifted valley sleep_

_ghosts of the marchland mountain keep,_

_There prowls Infantus, a yellow cat,_

_To find the menace, take the rat,_

_who comes to the gate of Redwall;_

_host to a warrior erased,_

_spirit with a verminous face,_

_He will hark to that vile place,_

_the cursed mountain hall._

Trust in your champion, child! The rat is not your friend. He belongs to Byron's fate."

The warrior held out a paw to her. Nadine took it, feeling light fill her like cold water on a summer day.

A boom sounded across the hall. Nadine whirled to face the doors. They shook as another boom sounded. Then another, Then another. "I shouldn't answer that," said Nadine.

"Remember this fear, for this how it will be when vermin bear down on you," said Martin. "You won't be able to hold against him long. Let him in, and stand behind me."

So Nadine hid behind him, and at her willing the doors opened. There entered a creature she had never seen. It was like an otter, big and dark, though unlike an otter the head was fine with a pointed snout. White markings skimmed his cheeks, and his black-tipped fur belied roots of muddy white. A tartan cloak of wide panes was draped on one shoulder and belted fast, revealing a short arm and half of a narrow chest; not a broad, rolly body like an otter's, but full of strength held close. Here walked a terror of trees and caves, a snake in the long grass.

As he strode into the hall, the surroundings dissolved like paper in water. The peaceful warmth of an afternoon at Redwall tore away into a wild landscape of bare hills. It was dark, whether from nighttime or a cloudy sky Nadine could not tell. A strong wind whorled around them, filling their clothes with air. Her last shred of courage drained from her, because the dream was wrested from her control completely.

"This mouse's mind is not your home!" said Martin to the beast. "How dare you intrude on her!"

"Canna a guest make himself welcome?" purred the beast. Nadine flinched when he looked at her. She dropped into a low crouch in the grass.

Martin drew his sword, and not a moment later, a spear ran him through. Nadine let out a cry. But the warrior mouse was standing there no longer. She was left in the empty wasteland, alone with the vermin.

"Calm y'self, lass. He'll find his way 'ere again. A mouse always does." He came to her and bent until they were nearly face to face; an unreal contortion since Nadine was doing her best to be grass. "Now what must I give ye, so that yew will set Oggmire free?"

"Wh—who is Oggmire?" asked Nadine, shaking.

"The rat whose life ye saved, Nadine of Redwall."

"There is not a thing you can give me! I follow Martin the Warrior. Redwall mice will always do what is right." Nadine looked around, waiting for her warrior to return, but he did not.

"Right? Is it right that my own quest be forestalled, on the whim of some mouse? Is it right if he is took to his homeland as captive?"

"It is fate," said Nadine. "You can't help it, even if you don't like it. If Byron is destined to take down a warlord—oh, he _would_ be—then that's what should happen. I am sorry that…Oggmire will be inconvenienced."

"Who says it is fate?" he demanded. "Fate is not one beast, and neither is it one spirit. Stand up!" Thunder rumbled in his voice, and Nadine leapt up in alarm. "If you care naught for his honor, maybe you care for his life. If yew do not remove him from this abbey, lass, I'll be forced t' take matters into me own paws."

"Y-you mean kill him?" said Nadine.

"Aye. I can find another body to inhabit. But where would your Byron find another beast to guide him to his destiny?"

"You would kill him just to spite a rival?"

"Hardly a rival," he said with a laugh.

As he did so, he was knocked aside by a flash of silver—Martin the warrior. Though they were in open land as far as the eye could see, the mouse came out of nowhere, as if his door was the darkness and the wind itself. As the sword slit the vermin's belly, Nadine shut her eyes and begged to wake up.

Nadine woke then, quite calmly. Competing senses confused her. Her hear beat fast, but on the whole she felt a bit slow, her head fuzzy with the troubling yet unclear memory of her dream.

She had fallen asleep in a lumpy old armchair in the infirmary. Her book was dropped on the floor. It was still night. Her candle still burned in its glass, and evidenced how little time had passed. The rat, whatever his name was, lay on a bed nearby, sedated from pain by one of Sister Gertrude's concoctions. Thankfully. Nadine shuddered remembering how he screamed when the Sister reset his arm.

Jacko was there, too, but he'd wisely chosen to nap in one of the other beds. The otter was a stubborn chaperone, though also an incompetent one. He drifted off the minute he lay down and was now snoring. They were alone, the three of them. Sister Gertrude had retired to her own room. No one else was there to watch the rat. All possible candidates would be in a drunk, overfed stupor from the evening's revelry.

Nadine then heard the unmistakable sound of footsteps at the bottom of the stairs. Whoever it was came up slowly, quietly. In a panic, she hurried to the door and locked it. She backed away, paw clutching her collar. Light welled in the gap between door and floorboards. The doorknob was tried, gently. When that didn't work, it was tried again, and then finally shaken with vigor.

Nadine took a deep breath to calm herself and yanked the door open angrily, a firm scowl planted on her face for whoever it was on the other side. A mouse she didn't know stepped back, looking at her in surprise. She could not recall if it was the same one who had beaten up the rat.

"What is your name?" Nadine demanded. The mouse did not respond. She went on in the most menacing voice she could muster, "If you do not leave right now, I will wake that otter guard sleeping there!"

"Who is it?" Jacko said, woken by her raised voice. Upon hearing him, the strange mouse bolted down the hall, to Nadine's relief. She followed him with her eyes until he disappeared down the stairwell.

She closed the door. "Whoever it was, he didn't have good intentions. Just a day ago I wouldn't have been scared of anything in this abbey, but now..."

The otter sat up. "Darkness lurks in all, m' dear. Seems our guest is not popular. I can keep watch over him, if you want to rest."

"No, I don't think I'll be able to sleep after that," said Nadine, walking back to her chair. "Since when are you so concerned with his safety?"

"He is a fated beast, according to Byron. Martin came to him in a dream and told him so."

Nadine gripped the armrest to steady herself, and sat down heavily as the full remembrance of her dream hit her like a wall. She was startled from the vantage of her chair to find the rat was awake and looking straight at her. Before she could remark on it, the rat shook his head very slightly. _No. Say nothing._ So she held her tongue.

"I don't know how much I ought to tell you," Jacko was saying. "But I think the Abbess will make an announcement tomorrow, once we have a chance to talk to him and sort things out. Oh, I don't see that it'll do much harm. You won't tell anyone else?" Famous words that began every chain of gossip at Redwall.

Nadine said, "I promise." Although she knew what would come out of the otter's mouth, and suspected the rat did, too.

"From what Byron said, there's a warlord in the North. A wildcat. We are to travel there and find him, and the rat will be our guide. My guess is he's one of the warlord's former cronies turned against him, like Graylunk the weasel who came to Redwall after fleeing from the ruler of Sampetra."

"Who is we? Who will travel?"

"Byron, of course. I suppose Harriet will want to accompany him, and some fit to fight. Maybe Skipper Dillon or Wylan will lend a paw. And…I hope, me. Perhaps Harriet will want to take you as well. I can put in a good word. Although, would you want to be around Byron that much?"

He expected her to light up with excitement, or else become a tearful mess again. But she said numbly, "Yes, I should appreciate it if you did."

She went back to her book, signaling that she was done talking. Jacko, though puzzled at her reaction, took the hint and settled back into bed. An hour or so passed. Nadine read a little, a silly but engrossing melodrama written by some repressed recorder in seasons past. Some warrior pining after somebeast's wife and so on. Mostly, she watched the rat over her page.

In her world, a fated beast was someone to be honored. Someone who journeyed with brave friends, returned triumphant, and was then titled Champion or perhaps Recorder or Abbot. This rat came alone, a hungry vagrant by all appearances. Fate must treat the vermin who perform its workings very poorly. What was his quest then? What else was there that brought him to Mossflower, if not simply to galvanize Byron?

When Jacko snored under his covers again, Nadine went to sit on the floor at the rat's bedside, arms wrapped about her knees. "Oggmire?" she inquired in a whisper.

The rat nodded. He made no move to sit up. "I'm sorry they chose yer head as a battleground. I wish yew hadn't let 'im in, but that can't be helped now."

"What is he?"

"A questing-spirit," said Oggmire. "Once, he were a living ferret long ago."

"That's what a ferret looks like? It's not at all like the pictures." In the illustrated histories, ferrets were always colored white with black arms and faces. They were depicted about the size of squirrels, if not smaller. _Unless they're warlords, of course._ Nadine realized for the first time that sizes in the pictures had more to do with symbolism than reality. Warlords were not always big creatures in life; they were drawn bigger to seem powerful and threatening. Their hordesbeasts were drawn small to seem weak. She felt very foolish.

"His kind's different from the ones down 'ere," Oggmire replied. "The lowland ferrets in those days mixed freely with polecats, so they were bigger and browner. Still do. If yer mother is called a ferret, you call yourself ferret, too." He snorted. "At first I thought 'e were just making himself look like that out of vanity, bein' a dream-ghost and all. But I've seen his memories, too. That's him, or at least how he saw 'imself. In death as in life."

Confused that he was speaking so warmly of the beast, Nadine said, "You know, he threatened to kill you if I didn't get you out of here."

"Did he now?"

"You think he's bluffing?"

The rat shook his head. "No. He's completely serious. I don't know whether he _can_, but I am sure he would. If that is what happens, so be it. The quest is more important. So you needn't cave to him. I myself am just a vessel of fate. I can be replaced with another." In the dim whispering candlelight he seemed to smile, eyes disregarding what was in front of him, his feet or the chair or the piece of black sky in the window, in favor of an invisible horizon. He had a natural squint, like a boatbeast, a farmer, or any such beast who spent his life looking into distances under the hot midday sun.

Nadine hissed, "No no no, how ludicrous! No hero of Redwall would call himself a vessel just because destiny came knocking, and neither should you! What is this quest that's worth more than your life?"

"I canna tell you that," the rat said calmly. "How do I know it won't get back to your elders? 'Fraid I'm not so chatty as the otter. Rest assured, it's got nothing to do with yew. Yer abbey is safe."

Nadine clutched her head with her paws. What else could there be in Mossflower that was important, other than the abbey? She had no desire to help him without knowing what their purpose in this land was, but without her intervention, the rat could die. If she did help the rat get out, she would be working entirely against Redwall, against the creatures who had the bringing up of her. But if she let the rat die, that too would be working against Redwall because he was crucial to Byron's quest. Putting all that aside, the basic morals taught by the Order of Redwall dictated that a death should be prevented if at all possible.

"Right, fine!" she snapped, before remembering to lower her voice. She listened to check that Jacko snored still. "I will help you. I'll get you out of Redwall. But I ask one thing in return."

"Name it."

"I'm coming with you. I will see you to the end of your quest. That way my conscience can rest knowing you're not out there murdering innocents or something." She had a half-baked notion of concocting some way to keep Byron informed of their whereabouts. But she did her best not to dwell on this idea—for all she knew, the ghost could read her mind.

The rat stared at the ceiling as if reaching for a thought, then looked back at her with displeasure. "He agrees. Very well."

"Shake on it?"

He gave her a blank look, but when she held out her paw, he reciprocated with his good one.

"It's dangerous out there, lass, north or south. Will ye be able to arm us? I'm fair with a bow."

"Not now, you're not." Nadine couldn't help smirking.

"Once I'm recovered, I'll be fair with a bow. I'm obliged if yew can find us one anyway, and a small blade in the meantime."

_I'll carry any blades myself, thank you,_ thought Nadine. "Why is it that you don't have weapons of your own, other than that knife?"

Oggmire let out a long, weighty sigh. "Got robbed crossing the Moss. They took about everything. Me blanket, me belt, bottle, bow. Britches, even. I nicked the knife off someone else later on."

Nadine thought no warrior of Redwall would have let himself be robbed like that. Then again, she couldn't imagine Byron having to travel anywhere alone. Could one be left without a weapon or flint or even clothes in the wilds of Mossflower, so easily? In one fell swoop, even the bare necessities of life could be taken. The thought unsettled her. And then the rat was driven to thieve, too, just to survive. She recalled the afternoon when she'd met him. _Why wasn't he kinder?_ She wondered angrily. A Redwaller is bound to help those in dire straits, even vermin. She could not have known that he was in such trouble; she thought he was some ordinary, no-good rat. _I would have helped him_, she thought firmly. _Of course I would have._

"Lass?" he said, breaking her thoughts. "There is one other thing. The ring. He wants his ring back, what the squirrel took."

* * *

**AN: It took a pandemic to revive this. Yikes. Thank you all once again for the reviews! They are much appreciated. As a sidenote, Tare was never mentioned in the series. I meant that I conjured a name for the deity Gabool the Wild mentions once ("great old one"? Something to that effect).**


	8. Chapter 8: Let Sprout

**Chapter 8**

**Let Sprout**

* * *

The night passed peacefully for the most part, except when Sister Gertrude came in to check on her patient and scared Nadine half to death. Very late or very early in the morning, probably close to the hour the kitchen staff rose, Nadine began to fall asleep in her chair again. Gertrude roused her with a cup of mint tea at the first bell. By the second bell, a wheel of interested parties came in and out of the infirmary to check on the rat. First the Abbess. She waited a good while for Oggmire to wake up but left in vain. Then there was Harriet, then old Skipper Dillon who volunteered one of his hungover otters as the unlucky first guard. After third bell, random beasts were descending to gawk, and when the number of them grew irritating, the otter guard finally shut them out.

The wedding guests left in a mass exodus. Nadine watched them from the window and breathed a sigh of relief. By late morning, few strangers remained in the abbey, and no longer did she have to fear unknown mice with a vendetta coming to smother Oggmire, or stab him in his sleep. Now, at least, the mundane danger was gone.

She went before the table, where Sister Gertude was buried in her notes. "I have to leave now for some chores. Would you keep a close eye on him?"

"But there's always someone watching him," said the graying vole, looking at the otter by the door.

"I should like for someone on his side to be here," Nadine replied. "I know I was only your assistant for a short time, but didn't you always say, 'a patient is a patient'? So if a patient is to be thoroughly questioned and prodded, shouldn't you be here to say when enough is enough? Will you promise to stay?"

"My dear, I don't know why you care so much. Look at you, all worn out from a sleepless night." Gertrude sighed. "But that's right: a patient is a patient. I've no plans to go anywhere." Nadine thanked her and headed for the door, only to turn around and return after a few steps. "What is it, child?" the Sister asked. "Please go. You've done enough."

Nadine sat down across from her. "How is it that you are able to forgive him? To treat him like a patient, I mean? Do you just try not to think of the things he's done or could have done?"

"There is no 'could'. A vermin at his age? Must have done wrong at some point," said Gertrude, easing back in her chair. "It's not surprising if you have reservations about him."

Nadine said, "A goodbeast is supposed to be bigger than that. Without mercy—"

"We become murderers. Yes, I know. I had the same schooling you did. For my part, I think turning a blind eye to a creature's faults isn't the answer. Forgiveness isn't like love or affection. It can't live on ignorance, especially not willful ignorance."

"Then how?" Nadine asked.

"You've got to seek to know a beast, to understand him. And even then, nothing may come of it. Between you and me, there are some beasts I've never forgiven. Your mother for one: having a child out of wedlock, asking us for shelter, only to leave you behind. I never forgave her for that, but I understood her. There were circumstances. And that's all one can do. Plant the seed of understanding, and let forgiveness sprout if it wants."

At the end of the room, Oggmire slept like the dead. Nadine wondered what he'd done, and how much of it she would be able to forgive. Soon, she would need to be forgiven, too. For treachery, for stealing supplies from the abbey, and whatever else might come down the road.

* * *

A bow was not difficult to find. There were a number of them unspoken for, in storage here or there. Beasts trained with them for sport. _Thank goodness he didn't ask for a sword_, Nadine thought. Now _that_ would have been tough to get. Fortunately, most archers were squirrels, so most bows were sized appropriately for a rat as well. Unstrung, the no-frills training bows looked like flat, nearly straight pieces of wood, except that there was a handle in the middle. The arrows were wood points only, but nothing could be done about that.

She took a second bow for herself. Most every dibbun had one or two shooting lessons. Though Nadine's limited experience was in the dim past of her childhood, she thought she could figure it out. The rat might show her. He had to—for the weeks it took him to recover, it was to his benefit that they were not defenseless.

Blades were common as dirt at Redwall. Sickles, kitchen knives, big heavy knives for chopping kindling. The problem was, these were tools. She doubted she could get into the armor room unnoticed to procure any proper weapons. She settled on taking an axe and brushknife from the woodcutting supplies.

The rat needed clothes, too. It wouldn't do for him to run about the forest in a nightgown. With the eyes of a good seamstress, she knew Byron was about the same in the shoulder, and of similar height. Though Byron had removed to better accommodations as a married beast, Nadine thought his things could still be in his old room. She was proven correct; his clothes were still there in his chest. There, too, was the large pile of things set aside for washday. He would not notice some of those missing.

But instead of taking the dirty clothes, she took a couple of his clean shirts and breeches, and substituted the dirty ones into the bottom of the chest. It was a small revenge, in her way. She took a coat, the older one that Byron wasn't wearing because he'd ripped a seam somewhere. He would assume it had gone for mending.

She jumped when the door opened. Byron gaped at her a moment, then slammed the door shut as if Cluny the Scourge was in the hallway. "Just what do you think you're doing in here? I got married yesterday! Are you trying to get me in trouble?"

Nadine patted the loot folded on her arm, saying quietly, "I'm just here to take some things for the wash. I thought I'd try to come when I wasn't likely to run into you. Guess that didn't work."

Byron was frowning. "I've got a wife to do all that, now."

"They're not going to make a brand-new bride do the laundry!" Nadine scoffed. "It's nasty work, and it takes about the whole day. If you ever bothered to come to the stream, you'd know. Me and the others agreed to share out your wash. Spare her paws this time."

"How kind of you. I'm sure it's all out of the generosity of your heart."

Nadine swept by him to the door. "Didn't have a choice."

It would have been easy to leave. But she felt compelled to stop. _Curses. Let it not end here_. She had to try to tell him. She had to try, no matter how much she hated him. He was the only one who could get her out of her predicament bloodlessly. Yet, she could not allow him to stop Oggmire from leaving Redwall. She could not even intimate that there was such a plan afoot—Byron's overreaction could mean deep trouble, not only for the rat but for herself. It was just her luck that her lifeline was the one beast in the abbey who distrusted her most.

She took her paw off the doorknob and turned around uncertainly. "Byron. I'm curious about something. Have you ever dealt with a kidnapping?"

He looked puzzled. "Like slavers? Why, do you know of someone kidnapped?"

"How would you go about searching for someone?"

Byron gave a disbelieving laugh. "Why are you asking? Look, if this is some ploy to get my attention—"

"You would try to track where they went. Right?"

"I…suppose. If we're lucky and there's a good trail. Now, I need to get changed—"

"What sort of trail?"

He shook his golden-brown head in resignation and assumed an officious pose, his fist sitting on his waist. "Pawprints, obviously. Or any ground or brush that's been trod on. Remnants of a fire. Fishbones or other garbage. Blood. Urine. Could be lots of things, but it's not as easy as it sounds. Slavers are usually good at hiding signs of themselves. Sloppy ones tend not to last."

Nadine listened to his list with rapt attention. She then said imperiously, "Good. Just checking you know how to do your job."

She swanned out of the room without another word. It used to be Byron would crack the door and look around first, to make sure beasts never caught her leaving his room. Carrying on at Redwall required planning, effort, and light feet: meet me at sunset, leave by first dark, wait ten minutes, don't stand by the window, peek out the door first, avoid that hallway, and so on. It also required the mettle to lie through one's teeth, and commit to secrecy.

Now she didn't care, and she was intensely eager to get out. _Byron must think me mad_, she mused. She hoped, when the time came, he would understand. He could not forget that conversation once she actually went missing.

Hurrying up to the next floor, she reflected that no mouse would want a maid who ran off alone with a rat, no matter what the reason. Whether they assumed she was in league with him, or that she was kidnapped, it was all the same. She had always envisioned a fine Mossflower mouse for herself. One with golden-brown fur, and brown eyes. His teeth could be a little crooked, just enough to be fascinating. And she rather liked a bit of a temper, so long as he was no fool. But no such mouse would want her now, if he existed. Not even Boris the blacksmith would want her.

Her children would never play among the abbey dibbuns, would never learn their letters from Jacko, and would never sit in a circle in Cavern Hole to be fed communally from the same paws that once fed her. But she tried already to become a goodwife. It didn't pan out, just as other things hadn't panned out. The roads to respect had dwindled in number. Indeed it seemed none existed anymore.

She returned to her room and added to the hoard under her bed. Of her own possessions, she set aside a coat, a practical skirt that only went to her ankles, and the smock she wore for her dirtiest chores. The rest was best left behind. The other maids could divvy her things up if she didn't come back. She scrawled notes of will and left them stitched to her clothes: "for Norra", "for Holly", and so on. She knew better than they did what suited them, anyway.

She snuck into the kitchen's dry-store during the crucial window of afternoon silence to procure vittles. Having packed for warriors many times before, Nadine knew precisely what would go the distance: the food that kept the best, divided easily, tasted decent, and did not weigh much. She made a list of her take, calculated the proper ration to make it last two weeks, and packed it away methodically.

If she was nothing else, she was at least sensible and a good little worker. Her preparations were many, detailed, and thorough. She found tinderboxes and canteens and put together a mending kit. She stole old blankets. She fixed the coat, sitting by her window and deliberating. Time carried her along like a dandelion seed. Soon, it would be washday.

* * *

The morning after the wedding, Fiora the otter was down for kitchen duty. Her cooking was not up to Redwall standards, so she was never invited to join the regular kitchen rotation, but being a bigger beast made her useful for certain tasks. Using the great old stone mill, for example.

She hauled the treasured granite beast out into the kitchenyard, and turned around to see the Friar following her out.

"By the way, Nadine's not showed up this morning," he said, crossing his arms.

Fiora said, "So?"

"Didn't give me a word of warning. I had to run my tail off, looking for a replacement last-minute!" The vengeful friar wrung his hat. He was the most stressed beast in the Abbey. Commanding the kitchen, which fed—at the least—three score beasts breakfast, dinner, tea, supper, and the occasional feast no matter the season, was not an easy calling. Indeed he performed more miraculous feats and great workings than the champion, abbess, infirmary keeper and recorder combined. All most beasts knew of this sustained suffering was the food on their plates, which they took for granted. It was not surprising his temper ran as hot as stoves.

Fiora straightened to her full height, dwarfing the barrel-bellied mouse. "Why're you complainin' to me?"

"Well, you're always with her. Tell her when you see her next that I'd like a word, please," he said testily.

_I will not_, thought Fiora, but nodded.

She got the mill set up and began the first batch of flour, when Norra the squirrelmaid plopped down next to her. "Haven't had anything yet, have you?" She shoved a mushroom roll in front of Fiora's face. The otter accepted a bite, then decided it was worth putting her work aside a minute.

"Why, that's gorgeous, Norra. Did you make it?"

"I did," said the squirrel proudly. "Filled in this morning. I searched deep within my heart and called forth baking skills."

"A true heroine," Fiora remarked. "The Friar's in yore debt, Honoria of Redwall. You should ask him for something."

"I'll keep it in my hat." The squirrel elbowed Fiora. "But never mind that. I saw you caught the wheat last night."

"As I remember it, I was minding my own business when I got smacked in the face. That gel has an arm, she does."

"It means you'll get married next, silly! It's a mouse tradition, or something."

Fiora went back to turning the mill. "I'm not a mouse. And I don't need any reminding I ought to get hitched, thanks. Beasts don't ever shut up about it. I only get a thousand letters a season from Ma, beggin' me to come back 'n tie the knot. She's the one who sent mere here in the first place!"

"You should join the Order," said Honoria. "I'm sure Sister Marianne would want you around. Could you imagine yourself a nun?" she giggled.

"Hey!" called a young hedgehog as he passed by. "Sister Fiora the Nun!"

"I saw you were drinkin' the ale last night, Robin Shortspike!" Fiora yelled. "You'll shut up lest you want me telling your Ma!"

Honoria snorted.

"I wonder if she'll come down for breakfast," said Fiora.

"Nadine?"

"No, that gel, Lily. Could you imagine a thing more humiliating? To have to eat with beasts the morning after you got married, and for everyone to know you'd done the deed? They'd all look at you knowingly. Some impertinent gobs might even joke or wink at you." The otter shuddered. "Makes you want to consider being a nun."

"You should do it. Can't be that bad. You'd just have to get used to wearing those awful robes." Norra stood, dusting her paws off on her apron. "Got to get back to cleanup crew. If you see Nadine, tell her she owes me."

"Doubt she'll want to see me," Fiora said. "I was rather short with her the other day."

Paws on her hips, Norra waited intently for her to continue. She had not witnessed what happened in the meadow, and like everyone else, she had an ear for others' business. Especially embarrassing business.

"Oh, it was for her own good," Fiora muttered. "She was talking to a rat while we were out, for pity's sake. She's getting out of control. It was bad enough with Byron."

"A rat, did you say? Like the one yesterday?"

"Yesterday?" Fiora asked, her brow furrowing.

"They caught a rat, I heard. Snuck in during the wedding and started stealing things. They've got him locked up in the abbey somewhere."

A rat! Thought Fiora, grinding away at the flour. Not the same one?

Fiora dashed up to Nadine's room afterwards, but there was no one there. Her bed was neatly made alongside the others. The otter looked for some time in what she thought were likely places. Nadine wasn't with the cleanup crew picking up around the grounds. At midday, she didn't turn up for dinner. She wasn't at the gatehouse. When Fiora returned to Great Hall, she caught sight of Jacko with the Abbess.

"Marm," she said, bobbing a curtsy at the Abbess. Then she took her uncle by the arm and dragged him away.

"Do you know where Nadine is?" she hissed, quiet as could be. "She's been missin' all day!"

Jacko looked at his niece with perfect calm and said lowly, "Check the infirmary."

"You think she's hurt?"

Jacko scoffed. "My gel, she's fine. She's just obsessed with that rat."

There was an otter standing outside the infirmary, a scrubbed-up Skipper Wylan of the East Fork. He doffed his beret very gallantly as she passed. Fiora gave him a reluctant smile, suppressing the urge to tell him his hat was stupid. It was best not to be rude to him. He was really one of the better options, and refreshingly artless. He asked her to dance _two_ reels yesterday, bless him. When he began to follow her into the infirmary, she whirled around. "Where d' you think yore going?"

He blinked. "There's a prisoner in there, Miss Coldstream. It's not safe."

Fiora narrowed her eyes at him. _My word, they do not even let me breathe._ "Shouldn't you go in first, then? If it's so unsafe? I'm sure there must be other beasts in there already?" To prove her point, she knocked on the door. Sister Gertrude called cheerily from the other side to come in.

The Sister smiled as they entered. It was a smile that could make the moon blush. It was the '_don't you make a handsome couple'_ smile. Gertrude was one of the more enthusiastic matchmakers around. Truly, Fiora regretted coming. And Nadine wasn't even in here!

The infamous rat lay on the bed, all puffy and bruised, his arm in a sling. Fiora drew to the bedside with an eagerness that discomfited the Skipper, who came to stand bristling at the headboard. Fiora was on edge, too. She didn't like being watched.

Sister Gertrude stood up. "Just in time, Fiora. I've got an order for you. I need burdock root and hazelwort. Oh, and—"

"We're out," said Fiora absentmindedly. She was preoccupied getting a good look at the rat's face. The same one? She thought yes. He was a dark and scrappy sort. Nothing distinguished him from any other rat, but it was unlikely that the two events—Nadine encountering a rat, and now a similar one showing up in the abbey infirmary—were unconnected.

"Out of what?" asked Gertrude.

Chafing under the gaze of both beasts, Fiora said dryly, "Everything. Plants. Garden's out of plants."

Gertrude chuckled. "Oh, I see. This one is such a laugh, Skipper. Kept us on our toes these past few seasons!" A scowl from Fiora, who was an excellent scowler, stopped the Sister in her tracks. "I…uh….I'll just write down that list, shall I?"

"If yore done advertising on my behalf, Sister. I actually came looking fer Nadine. She's been giving me the runaround all day. Heard she was in here."

"Oh, I'm afraid she left this morning. Said she had work to do, though. I should think in the kitchen."

Fiora sagged. "Right, shore. What's the story on the rat?"

Skipper Wylan said, "He was apprehended yesterday fer robbery. Tried t' escape while everyone was distracted last night. Some beasts stopped him, and they got into a fight. He broke his arm."

"Dislocated," said Gertrude. "Though he has a bit of a fracture in the forearm, too. I expect someone must have dragged him by that arm."

"How is he not awake yet?" asked the Skipper.

"I gave him a bit more of my sleeping draught. Seemed like he could use the rest, before beasts start pestering him."

Fiora shook her head, unable to make head or tail of it. Anger fledged in her chest, thinking of Nadine at the bedside of a creature who had not long ago brandished a knife at her. But Nadine was always like that. Fate had given her generous sympathies and not quite the sense to temper them. Fiora left the infirmary, the garden order strangled in her paw. Wylan followed her out.

"I'm sorry to see ya so anxious, Miss Coldmarsh. I'd help you find yer friend, but I'm needed here."

Fiora turned to face him. She reached for _it's none of your business_ or, _no one asked you in the first place, you self-important toad_. But he was being perfectly nice, and was surely not the kind of beast that tolerated childish barbs. She knew she needed growing up, or else she would see doors close to her. "That's too bad," she said simply, and kept walking.

She found Nadine in possibly the last place one would look. The little garden-house was where all tools and necessities were kept for gardening, for woodcutting, for forage expeditions. Fiora went in there to write down the infirmary order in the record book. How odd that she should find the mousemaid crouched by the bookshelf. Nadine was never in the garden voluntarily, except for the six-and-sixty days where she'd tried it out and decided she hated it. One counted the days when Nadine tried something, because she was bound to stay longer than made her happy, and bound to drop it in the end. It was a thing to bet on; Fiora got a flask of blueberry wine off Uncle Jacko from that one.

Fiora rolled up the paper and gave her a good whack on the head.

"Hey! What's that for?"

"For being a pain. _Edible_ _Plants of the Monastic Forest_?"

Nadine swiftly tucked the book under her arm, out of sight.

"Are you planning to run away?" Fiora asked in amazement, as Nadine inched toward the door. "What's going on, Nadine? There's a rat in the infirmary, yore dropping chores 'n stealing a field book. It's like two plus two turning out to be twenty. What am I missing? Stars above, please don't tell me yore in love with him. Why aren't you talking to me? Are you mad at me?"

"Oh," Nadine sighed. "I'm not mad at you."

"Then tell me what's happening!" said Fiora. "Look at you; yore about to run off with this rat, aren't you? That's a real step down from Byron. That's a whole flight of stairs."

Nadine flattened her ears, a gesture that really shows up on a mouse. "It's not what you think. Look, Martin came to me in a dream."

"_Martin the Warrior_ came to you in a dream and told you to run off with a rat?!"

"Er, no. He actually told me the opposite."

And, in an exhausting conversation, Nadine spilled out to her everything that had occurred. She told of Harriet capturing the rat; of Martin and the ferret spirit; of the conflicting quests; of the deal she made with Oggmire; the preparations she'd been making since morning. Fiora grabbed her by the shoulders.

"Do you realize how insane you sound? Let Byron deal with this! Who cares if some rat dies?"

"He's not going to believe me!" Nadine spat back. "If I don't do anything, it'll be bad for all parties involved. Oggmire, Byron, everyone. The only thing I can think to do is get him to the end of his quest first, and to get Byron to back off until he does. That's the only way he'll cooperate."

Fiora pinched the bridge of her nose, as if a headache came on. "It's like you're some kind of hostage."

"No, no, the rat is the hostage." Nadine sank to the floor, against the wall. "And it's my fault he's here in the first place! I don't think he's that terrible, Fi. He doesn't deserve this."

"What if he's lying to you, just to escape? What if it wouldn't really kill him?"

"I don't know! There's nothing I can do about that, is there?"

Fiora began to pace. "Shut up, we can figure this out. My word, Nadine, just tell Byron!"

"_I can't._ He doesn't trust me anymore. He certainly will not trust me if he learns I've got one foot out the door, paw-in-paw with a rat! What if he decides I'm a traitor? No one would doubt his word. Don't they execute beasts for that?"

"Not at Redwall," Fiora replied. "Though I can name a few otter holts who would, and happily." She shook her head. "It's all yer fault, you know? You shouldn't have got so entangled with Byron. He thinks yore deceptive, now. Everyone does. Even if they don't understand why, they have that impression of you."

"Do you?" Nadine asked.

"Tch. No. I mean, no. Of course not! No. Maybe." She sighed at the crestfallen look on Nadine's face. "Look, I think you've got the best of intentions. We just need to convince others of that. What if I go with you? I could vouch for you if there's trouble."

Nadine gazed at her wonderingly. "You would do that?"

"Yes! I've got loads more clout than you," said Fiora. "If I go too, I could see what this is all about, and with my word backing you up, they wouldn't think you were a traitor, or ruined. I would be witness; I could tell them beyond doubt that you were acting for good—and that you didn't sleep with him!"

Fiora startled as Nadine embraced her, the tips of her ears not quite reaching the height of an otter's chest. She felt like she was holding a fluffy sparrow chick. "Fiora Coldstream, I doubt there will be a single creature who sees me as anything other than questionable after this, but thank you."

"Washday, is it?" Fiora asked, quickly packing away her embarrassment. "Not a bad plan. The gates will be open. Now, how d' you plan to communicate with 'em?"

"Leave the most obvious trail I can, I thought. I spoke to Byron this morning, hinted that I would."

Fiora shook her head. "That's not enough. Beasts are never that clever. We need to be more obvious. We need to make it transparent that we want them to follow us. C'mon, I've got an idea."

She led Nadine to the back room of the garden-house, where seeds and sundry items were kept. She dipped her paw into a burlap sack and retrieved a clump of gravel. The stones were like a sunset – golden, orange, and red.

"These are sandstone. The color stands out. If we leave a trail of these, they can't miss it."

* * *

**AN: Thanks as usual for the review, Way, and for taking a gander at this one.**


	9. Chapter 9: Leaving Redwall

**Chapter 9  
**

**Leaving Redwall**

* * *

In the village, when he was a lad, his name had not been Oggmire. The village itself was called Oggmire. If a rat grew up and left home, he took a different name sometimes. Maybe for anonymity or respect. Maybe to sever him from his young self. Usually it was something like Grayclaw or Redfang, despite that rats did not have fangs. Oggmire was good enough for him. And it was not a lie; Oggmire was what he was. It was no more a lie than calling wheat a grass.

The valley was a hard place for certain creatures. A rat or shrew or hedgehog could hunt only in the twilight. That was good as law. If the foxes caught you out with your sling or bow at night, you were taken to the Archfox's camp for a good thrashing, and kept in a cangue until your mother noticed you missing and went groveling for your release. If the stoats caught you hunting in the day, their idea of punishment was to hang you upside-down from trees. Not long enough to kill you, usually. But only for the fright.

Which is to say, he was used to the tempers of the mighty, and not much scared him. Anyway, they would all come to his domain in the end. Though the proud vermin of the woods and moors liked to make village-dwellers feel small, they buried their dead in the graveyard at Oggmire like anyone else. And a rat would dig their grave and guard it. You could not trust any vermin but a rat to look after the dead.

Since he was old enough to hold a spade he had a paw in digging. Everyone in the burrow did. But it was the Undertaker who was responsible for keeping the ten-day watch, and only grown males sat vigil with him. Oggmire was not of age yet. He delivered them water sometimes, trekking across the graveyard in the night, kneeling by the master's chair to replenish the pot. They pretended he was not there.

The only other time he saw the Undertaker was on his days to hunt, when he went for a blessing beforehand. He would troop up to the mud house, with two or three of the babies trailing behind him like ducklings, begging to come along. The Undertaker met them on his porch. He was a gruff rat whose fur had gotten silvery, and he rarely looked anybeast in the eye. And never did he extend that courtesy to Oggmire. He would glide from the shadows of his house, holding in one paw a cup of fire, which sent a powerful trail of smoke into the thatch. The other paw he would place on each of their heads in turn when they bowed before him.

When Oggmire got there one morning with his sister and cousin in tow, however, the Undertaker wasn't out to greet them. A rabbit doe sat in his chair, tipping it back on two legs, her big feet propped on the porch fence.

She tipped a hat plumed with a red feather, and smiled thinly at them. "Wot darlin' bairns."

From inside the house came a voice. "That you, lad?"

"Aye!" he replied.

The Undertaker came out with the smoking cup, and gave them his blessing. The rabbit watched the proceedings silently, a polite but distant smile on her face. After he clapped his rough paw on Oggmire's head, the young rat could tell there was something wrong. He was nervous.

The hunt was unsuccessful. Distracted and puzzled at the strange behavior of his master, Oggmire couldn't think straight. He gave up on birds halfway through and went after eggs, so his trip would not be completely worthless. The babies were more entertained by that than watching him fail to shoot birds anyway. They returned home bearing eggs, dandelion, and wild onions in their tunics. He knew the instant they went by the gate that something was wrong at the house.

"I smell blood," he said. he sent the babies off to get help, and went through the gate.

"Sir?" he called.

When there was no answer from the house, he went inside. The Undertaker lay there, lifeless on the floor, his shirtfront covered in crusting blood. The rabbit was in the corner going at the ground with a spade. She seemed unfazed by the sudden appearance of a reedy, half-grown rat in the house, and glanced at him indifferently.

"Wh—why did you?"

"What's the expression 'mong you lot? There's a special place in Hellgates for one who defiles a grave?"

"He'd never," Oggmire said. He knelt and took the Undertaker's cold paw in his.

"But he did. Helped rob the highest grave in all the land, your Pa."

"My _what_?"

The rabbit grinned at his horrified expression. "Oh lad, you dinnae know that? Of course he were a bit frosty, weren't he? More and more as you grew? A beast in his autumn doesn't always like spring starin' him in the face. Look, I can prove to you what he did. Here is his hoard."

She opened the box she had dug up. There was a massive armbrace within, and a bronze collar in two pieces. Whole, it could have sat as a hat on a large rat's brow. The surfaces were pitted and dark as mountainsides, but he could make out the engraved figures of grimacing cats therein. The smell of ancient metal brought him to tears.

"There's supposed to be pieces of bone inside 'em," said the rabbit. "They're reliquaries. King Mortspear's reliquaries. If you still do not believe me, you can go with me to his tomb in the high mountains. They are rats that watch over him there. They'll be glad t' see these back, and to receive your repayment for your father's trespass."

Her long ears twitched then. She looked sidelong at him, displeased. "There's beasts outside. You called reinforcements, did you, me liddle tattletale?"

"I'm not sorry," he said valiantly. "You murdered an _undertaker_. They'll want you dead."

"Is there a way out?" the rabbit asked.

"Not one where they couldn't see you."

Then Oggmire began to hear it, too. All the rats of the burrow. Spikeburn, the village head. They were coming up the path. As the voices outside swelled into a veritable tide, the rabbit's ears drooped. "Suppose that's that, then." She turned to him. "'Ere, in case they hang me." She tossed him something small and round. He caught it between his palms. It was an iron ring. It had something written inside.

"What's this?"

"Responsibility," she replied. "You brought him on yourself. Return those relics for me, lad."

With that, she marched out to her death.

* * *

The mouse smelled like ghost. Oggmire watched as Byron sat down beside him, crossing one leg over the other. His trimmed claws tapped on the armrest. He smelled of new clothes. Supper. A mate. And ghost.

It was unusual that Oggmire could not smell more.

_Aye, the mouse spirit has him locked up tight_, said Tawnhide in his ear. _Focus on the others._

The ferret never showed himself, for Oggmire's sake. It was difficult to manage talking to others while trying not to stare at a shadow only you can see creeping across the floor. Tawnhide was currently, perhaps, living in the inch of space behind Oggmire's headboard, or under the bed, or hovering behind the shoulder, just out of sight. Oggmire never looked for him.

The room was packed; many had been waiting on bated breath for him to wake. The squirrel who caught him paced around in the back. The otter, Jacko, sat at the table, his pen at the ready. The nurse, Gertrude, had conceded her desk to him and was standing by. Two other otters stood by the door. And there was of course, the two mice who radiated authority. The testy warrior, and an elder female who took another chair at the bedside.

_She is not the war-leader,_ said Tawnhide. _That's him, despite his youth. She is more like a magistrate._

This one smelled very clean. Soap. Morally clean, too. There was righteousness, like a cold breeze on the nostrils.

The nurse brought Oggmire a porcelain washbowl, and poured in steaming water to clean his paws. Then he was served dinner: warm vegetable soup, fragrant bread. It was difficult after that, to think and to smell beyond the comforting meal in front of him.

Oggmire could not deny that he was hungry, but he ate with all the dignity he could muster. Didn't want these beasts thinking he was grateful to them. He knew that's what they wanted to see; they wanted him to stuff his face, and to be brought to tears by their generosity. They wanted badly to see a vermin be thankful to them, to have him in their pocket. That's what Her Honor in the habit wanted especially.

He took a sip of water to clear his throat. "Enjoyin' the view?" he asked them.

No one was amused.

It was the mouse wearing the habit who spoke first. "Tawnhide, is it?"

"I am called Oggmire, Your Honor," he replied sweetly.

She blinked in surprise at his disarming words, then gave a chuckle. "No need to be so formal. My name is Moraine. I am Abbess of Redwall. And this is Byron, Abbey Champion. I believe you've met Jacko and Harriet, and the two Skippers back there?"

"Marm."

"Where do you come from, Oggmire?"

He didn't respond.

"I assure you, you are among friends." The abbess spread her hands. "You can speak freely."

"Out with it, rat," said Byron.

Harriet said, "Is it Bristlowth, by chance?"

Oggmire looked at her in surprise.

_How did she come up with that?_ Tawnhide mused.

"Aye, that's right," said Oggmire. "Bristlowth."

The squirrel held her chin. "But Redshanks rules there, so who is the wildcat? Unless—has Redshanks been toppled already?"

"No, that fox is very much alive. As for a wildcat…I don't know what you're on about. Never seen a cat in me life. They're rare, so I hears."

Byron leaned forward. "I don't believe you."

Oggmire stared at him evenly. "And what can I do about that?"

"What do you know about a spirit?" asked the abbess, trying a different tack. "A dead warrior?"

_And I were ever a better warrior than him what they call a champion._

Oggmire held his smile in his teeth. "Don't know any warriors. I'm just a gravedigger from Bristlowth. You expect me to 'ave the friendship of wildcats and warriors, Marm?"

The squirrel glared at him.

_She recognizes you. Maybe she saw you in Bristlowth._

Oggmire had no idea who this squirrel was. He would have remembered meeting a squirrel in Bristlowth. Squirrels were generally not found at the seaside. Harriet tossed something onto his lap: the tartan cloth. Oggmire raised his brows as understanding dawned on him. What she had seen was the Recovery Union—not him in particular. Even if she had truly laid eyes on him some time, it didn't matter. He would eat his tail if a squirrel could pick out one rat from a group of rats. Oggmire ran a claw along the blue-and-orange weave. "This owld thing? You dinnae have to return it."

"Where did you get it?" Harriet asked.

"Stole it, didn't I?" Oggmire replied swiftly.

What did these beasts think they could get from him? It was a simple matter of saying he didn't know anything, like a child does if one's mother is taking him to task. Or a young Marchland rat, if he is brought before the Archfox. Except now Oggmire had more seasons of willpower behind him, and these beasts were about as terrifying as Valpin's pinky claw, and he needn't concede anything, since he was warm and fed and would be gone in two days. Deny, Deny. So it went into the evening.

Finally, when every beast was well frustrated, Byron said, "Maybe I should speak with him alone, Abbess."

"Very well. I leave you to it." She rose regally, folding her paws into her habit sleeves, and bid Oggmire goodnight. She beckoned for Harriet and Jacko to follow her out. Oggmire was left with Byron, and the two "skippers".

"Sister Gertrude, why don't you get going, too?" said the younger otter politely.

"I'm fine as I am, thank you," said Gertrude. She examined the book shelf and pulled a volume out by the spine.

Byron said, "Truly, Sister, we can handle ourselves. Go on."

Gertrude frowned. "Child, I am a good twenty seasons your senior. It was I who delivered you into this world. You are mistaken if you think you can order me out of my own sickbay."

Byron let out a sigh. Behind him, the younger otter's disappointment surged like a tide.

_Woodlanders, lad. They canna be cruel if a female is watching. It's their code of honor. The lass has armored you in a suit of politeness. At least I will not have to sit by and see ye humiliated again, as you always force me to. _

"Wipe that smile off your face," muttered Byron. "By fates, rat, if you were any other, your neck would have been acquainted with my sword by now. But seeing as how my life is one long joke, I am forced to work with you."

"I'm much flattered t' be the one rat whose head you've not cut off."

"It is a greater kindness than you would show any mouse. That's the chains of being a Redwaller. I can't do to you what you would do to me." Byron rubbed at his temples. "Look, you loathsome excuse for a rodent; whatever you're running from, I can help you. I can defeat him. I'm on your side, alright? I can free the Northlands from any menace."

"Where I come from, defeatin' a lord means you earn his place," replied Oggmire.

Byron was taken aback. "No, you misunderstand. I don't presume to be a king, or anything. That's not how we do things."

"What then? You'll go and cut off his head, and what? Will you leave those beasts without a leader, vulnerable inside and out? Leave 'em weak, for the next warlord t' come along? Let him take their food and bring about famine? Let 'em turn on each other? Let weasels decide to start eating rabbits again?"

"In our forest, there are no such problems," said Byron, crossing his arms. "Things are under control here. We are at peace. And we have no king."

"Says the one who lives in a castle. But you're right; yew are not a king. No Northerner would 'ave you for one, if yew are not big enough to fix what ye break."

"From what you're telling me, it sounds like it's already broken and not worth the spackle," said Byron. "I don't need your respect, rat, or the twisted admiration of any vermin. I need you to point me to the place and get out of my way."

Oggmire could put up with significant insult to himself. Pride was a silly thing for a middling creature like him to have. Pride was for chieftains or captains. But the mouse had wounded something in him that was beyond his own dignity. He could not help but to bite back. "Would you hark at that, the pore lad don't know his way 'round a compass!" he hissed. "The sun sets in the West and rises in the East, mousie. A bairn could work out how to get where he's going. I see now, not only are you not a king, you are little more than a whelp!"

Before he could say much else, Byron slapped him with the back of his paw. Oggmire touched his stinging face in surprise, feeling the mouse's knuckles pulse on his cheek several times over.

"That's quite enough." Sister Gertrude stood up, closing her book with a snap. She sighed. "Honestly, is it so hard to have a civil conversation? Byron, I think you'd better go for now."

"I hope you get good 'n lost," Oggmire said quietly at the mouse as he stood.

"There's more where that came from," retorted Byron. "Next time."

* * *

If there was any reason to dislike winter ending, and the weather becoming warm, it was that one had to wash clothes again. The abbey pond was drinking water, so it was never to be dirtied with laundry. That was why, once a month, all the wash was collected in masses and carted to a creek nearby, or to the Moss itself if the creek was dried up. A half-mile stretch of pebbly beach would be subjected to a cacophony of female voices, and the merciless wringing and beating and scrubbing required to clean clothes. This carried on for a day or two, until all the the clearing filled up with clotheslines.

Abbeybeasts had long forgotten to be ashamed of their dirty laundry. Smocks and shifts and linens rained from the windows of Redwall on washday mornings. They tumbled down stairwells and flowed out of doorways. They built up on the grounds like great snowdrifts. Every wagon, cart, and wheelbarrow that the abbey could spare sat ready for this onslaught. Beasts dashed about like ants, collecting, sorting, loading.

Fiora watched the work from the gatehouse window, arms crossed. "Where does it all hide?" she said to herself, shaking her head. With those great piles of clothing being excreted, she wondered that any room in the abbey had air to breathe. Well, no matter: it wasn't her problem. Not this time.

She went to her uncle's writing table and opened his daily journal. That is, the Recorder's personal thoughts and opinions of events, composed very carefully to seem informal and spontaneous. There was much, much written over the past couple of days. She wedged her letter against the current page. He would see it when he sat down to write again. From what she knew of her uncle's habits, matters would be transparent for everyone by tonight or tomorrow morning—and no sooner. She collected the basket of Jacko's wash that was left out for her, and went to dump it into her cart outside.

Her next stop was Harriet, whose room was up among the dormitories. Fiora knocked politely at the Sister's door, knowing full well that Harriet was downstairs, eating. She let herself in, gathered Harriet's wash to drop out the window, and meanwhile cast an eye around the room. Unusually for Redwall, it was cluttered with oddities and curios. The ring Nadine had described to her was sitting on Harriet's narrow writing table, in a tray along with a dagger. Fiora swiped the ring.

Nadine meanwhile had actually turned up for kitchen work that morning. As agreed upon, she met Fiora afterwards, at the bottom of the stairs that went up to the infirmary hallway. She carried a heavy dinner tray. The ottermaid signaled that all was well, and Nadine handed her the tray. "His is the blue plate," she whispered in Fiora's ear. Fiora nodded. She ascended to the infirmary hallway, where the grizzled Skipper Dillon was pacing around, bored on his watch.

"Food's here!" said Fiora, smiling at him. "I thought we could eat together, Skipper; give you some company. I'd love to hear some war stories 'bout you and grandad, eh?" She put the tray down on a pleasantly sunny window ledge not far from the infirmary door, indicating that she wanted to sit there in particular, out in the hallway.

The skipper happily agreed and brought out two chairs. As the two otters sat down and exchanged pleasantries, Nadine went by into the infirmary, waving briefly to them in greeting. Inside, she smiled cheerily at Sister Gertrude. "Why don't you go down to eat, Sister? I can watch him for a bit."

Gertrude stood up. "Thank you, m'dear. Ah, it'll be nice to stretch my legs!"

"Take a turn about the grounds, too," said Nadine after her. "No need to hurry back on my account."

The sister went out. From beyond the doorway, Nadine could hear her taking her leave to the Skipper.

Oggmire didn't need to be told it was time to go. He sat up stiff like rusting clockwork, and watched in attentive puzzlement as Nadine moved a chair to the bookshelf—she had done the same last night. Nadine stood on the chair, ran a paw along the top of the bookshelf, produced a key, and then used that key to open the medicine cabinet. This time, instead of taking something, she replaced a bottle that she had stolen earlier, and then put the key back in its place as well.

She retrieved a bundle that she had hidden under Oggmire's bed. The rat cast a displeased eye at the clothes she tossed beside him: a linen shirt, brown breeches, the hardwearing green coat, and a belt of woven cord.

"What, not enough skulls and leather for you?" Nadine whispered.

He half-smiled at her jest, then shook his head. "They reek of _him_, lass."

"Do they?" She sniffed and saw he was right. Despite being laundered, the clothes carried a slight musk of the wearer in their threads. Once beckoned, Byron crawled into her nose and nestled warmly there, nudging alive a memory of what it was like to kiss him on the cheek. "Heavens above, so they do," she said, recovering herself. But they would have to suffice.

Oggmire obediently allowed her to help him dress. The fit was not as well as she thought it would be. The shirt engulfed his bony frame and the britches were a bit short; but if someone held Nadine at swordpoint she might say he looked wholesome, with the whiteworked collar tied neatly shut at his throat and the dignified coat hung on his shoulders, underneath which his arm was cradled against his ribs like a precious infant. He might have looked downright Mossflorian, if it wasn't for that heavy-browed, mean face of his. Some rats could be mistaken for mice; Oggmire was not one of them.

"The ring?" he asked in a hushed voice.

"We've got it," Nadine replied.

"Now what?"

Nadine shushed him. "Just wait."

Outside, Fiora looked on as Skipper Dillon lifted the bowl of hotroot soup to his lips. She had provided a patient ear for the old otter who was rambling about his stories. To him she seemed very interested. Really, she watched him for a hooded eye, or a drooping head, or a yawn. The thing about shrimp-and-hotroot was, its strong flavor hid the taste of anything. For instance: a heavy dose of Sister Gertrude's sleeping concoction.

The old otter finally nodded off in his chair, chin in chest. Fiora waved a paw in front of his face, to be certain he was solidly asleep. Satisfied, she went to look in on the infirmary, and frowned seeing the rat dressed in good clothes. For a strange moment, otter and rat took the measure of each other silently. Then Fiora gestured for them to come out. The three of them crept cautiously by the skipper and then hurried down the stairway. When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Oggmire said "Wait. I 'eard a door close." He looked down the hallway, and pointed out the door in the end.

"But that's a storeroom," whispered Nadine. She knew there should be nothing in there except disused, skeletal furniture, and spare infirmary cots.

They stood in uncertainty for a moment, until finally Nadine marched to the door and opened it. Inside, there cowered a hedgehog, whom Nadine recognized vaguely from his youth. "Umbert!"

Fiora and Oggmire came to stand behind her, looking over her shoulder. Umbert was shaking. He began to scream, but Fiora—who at this point thought it her responsibility to keep the Skipper asleep—pushed past Nadine, grabbed Umbert by the collar, and muffled him with a paw as big as his face.

"This isn't what it looks like," Nadine began to say to him, only to falter.

"Get 'im on the floor, on 'is back," said Oggmire. "So the quills don't get you."

The maids looked at him aghast.

"What?" he said. "Do you want him gettin' us caught? We got to tie 'im up. Hold him down, otter."

"My name ain't otter," growled Fiora. But being roughly twice the size of Umbert, she was easily able to hold him supine as the rat described, though she could not restrain all the little limbs at once while also maintaining the iron clamp she had on his muzzle. He thrashed about quite a lot, to her annoyance.

Nadine, who was a bit dazed, was brought back to ground by the rat shaking her shoulder.

"Lass, it's not the time to lose courage. Can this room be locked?"

"Yes," Nadine replied. "The key should be back in the infirmary. I can find it."

"Go quickly then."

"Bring back something to tie him with!" said Fiora. "Pillowcases or washcloths should work. My word, would you listen to me—saying such things?" She reared her head back a bit as the hedgehog loosed his arm and swatted at her. "Hurry up, would you?"

Nadine bolted up the stairs once more, and tiptoed past the sleeping Skipper. She opened cabinets in the infirmary frantically, looking for the keyring. She came upon it in a box by the medicine cabinet. Stuffing the keys into her pocket, she went to grab a stack of cloths from the linen chest. She rushed back downstairs, dancing softly past Skipper Dillon again.

Instructed by Oggimre, Nadine wound a washcloth into a ball, which Fiora then shoved into the hedgehog's mouth to gag him. The two maids tied the hedgehog to a cot frame, arms behind his back.

Satisfied, Oggmire told them to come out. Nadine closed the door on Umbert, taking in his furious face with sadness. "Sorry," she whispered. She locked the door, but left the key in.

"Ye should toss the keys," Oggmire said.

"I am not going to have that poor hedgehog be trapped in there for ages," snapped Nadine. "We'll be long gone by the time someone finds him."

The trio proceeded down the next flights of stairs more cautiously, for they were more likely to encounter others on the lower levels. Fiora went first, peeking around corners and doorways, stopping them whenever she spotted a beast. Gradually, they made it to ground, and went down a narrow, musty, passage. They came out of the abbey at a little-noticed side door, where Fiora had her cart waiting, with their packs and supplies hidden, bundled in a bed sheet under a layer of laundry.

The grounds were busy still, but no one, if they saw them for a brief moment, paid them any attention. Fiora supported the rat as he climbed into the cart with his one good arm. And then the two maids were off to join the caravan of vehicles leaving the abbey gates.

"By fates, this is heavy," Fiora huffed, for she was the one pulling the cart.

"How are you faring in there?" Nadine whispered.

"Disgusted," replied Oggmire, in a muffled voice. "I used t' dig graves and this is worse."

By then, they were outside the wall. Nadine and Fiora had agreed the night before that they could not make it all the way to the creek: the cart would be too heavy, and the ride horrifically bumpy and unpleasant for the rat. So they contrived to fall behind all the others, and veer off the well-worn track as soon as they could manage to not be seen.

Oggmire breathed deeply once he was pulled out. He sat down heavily in the grass. Nadine tossed him his ring, and then hopped onto the cart to fish out their supplies. The packs were to be shouldered by her and Fiora, for the time being. She gave Oggmire the larger bow on a strap; though he could not use it yet, it was light enough to be carried without trouble. She gave Fiora the woodcutting hatchet and the large brushknife, hung a smaller knife on her own belt, and shouldered her own bow that she had yet to learn to use.

Oggmire raised his eyebrows at the result. "Fairly kitted us out, 'ave ye?"

"One must always err on the side of being better prepared," Nadine replied.

"Alright, say your goodbyes," Fiora said, wiping the sweat off her face with her sleeve. The otter looked over her shoulder at the red form of the abbey, visible through the trees. Nadine gazed, too, at the venerable structure, which glowed under the noon sun. Soon it would be in a whirlwind of confusion, of whispered news, of chains of talk. Or, perhaps little would change for most beasts, and as soon as the novelty subsided, they would go back to lives as peaceful and still as this landscape.

"Lead on, rat," said Fiora.

Oggmire turned southwards, which would have them cutting even farther away from the main path. Fiora this time walked behind the other two, her skirt pockets heavy with the red stones. She tossed one into the cart as they left.

* * *

**Boy, did this one give me trouble. Oggmire's voice is tough to write in. Originally was supposed to be two chapters, but since it's divided into three sections, there just was not a natural way to split it. So, this is my longest chapter yet at 4,900 words.**

**Thanks as always for the reviews, Grey and Way. They do keep me going. Don't hold your breath about those randos in chapter 5/7 getting a comeuppance; they won't :(. **


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